“Thanks, but I’m afraid not. I’ll join the group events from time to time, but otherwise I just try to avoid mixing work and socializing as a general rule.”
I am skeptical that he would not have already spotted the pattern in your responses to individual vs. group invitations, but this at least makes it clear.
You don’t get to pick your Co workers.
In which case it sounds like you need to avoid more than ‘just a few social situations’, you need to pretty much stay at home 24/7, no? If you can’t trust yourself to not be knocked off your feet at some point?
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Attraction doesn’t happen out of nowhere. It doesn’t knock you off your feet. Out builds out of a friendship with someone where there is an emotional connection and the underlying potential attraction.
I can see a difference. At a work lunch your talk about people and events and gossip and then it ends. At a bar, one on one, it can linger and you get into talking about hopes and fears and dreams and regrets and those are the sorts of confidences that can grow into attraction.
Ok, so I also have a policy of never going out to a bar, alone, with a male coworker. Why? I work with a small office, and I can explain to them easily, but beyond this small world is a gigantic statewide network of offices, and I cannot explain to them, and rumors fly as quick as a moment. I have heard other women - and I am ashamed to say, I’ve even heard it in this office on occasion - that so-and-so must be sucking someone’s dick to be in the position they are in. I’ve heard it said about men and I’ve heard it about women. I’ve only heard it from women, but that’s possibly only because I am a woman.
If you think gossip and cattiness and downright bitchiness are not a thing then I don’t know what beautiful world you live in. And the thing is, the woman who said this in our office, is a wonderfully nice, intelligent person - until her inner bitch came out. (When she said it, I said, “I don’t care to hear such talk,” and walked away, but I was the only one who walked away, and everyone else stayed to listen. And giggle. It’s not funny to impugn someone like that.)
I want my behavior to be above reproach at all times. And thus I’d never go out with a male coworker, to a bar, just the two of us. I probably wouldn’t even go out to lunch with just the two of us unless it was a special occasion.
You don’t get to choose your coworkers. And I can totally believe that he hasn’t picked up on the pattern. Men - scratch that - People aren’t exactly always the most observant!
Gee - I don’t know, if you can’t trust yourself, maybe don’t linger? Maybe don’t talk about your hopes and dreams and fears and regrets? :smack:
I mean, jesus christ on a pogo stick, how hard can it be? You all make it sound like after the third drink the conversation inevitably, invariably, irresistibly goes from discussing the pros and cons of the third season of The Wire to what your dream date would be and how you always really wanted to write a novel.
If you cannot recognize that other people have their own comfort levels, you should not be giving advice to others.
Just as an fyi, and speaking only for myself, when people (especially men) ridicule my comfort level or demand justification, I become wary of those people.
That’s what I was trying to put into words and couldn’t figure out how. It’s none of anyone’s business why I choose to do what I do, other than maybe my SO. My SO is not controlling or demanding. I do what I do because it’s MY comfort level.
Why is one supposed to care about a bunch of made up gossip? People are going to talk shit about you no matter WHAT you do.
How is this so difficult? I do care. I know people are going to talk shit about you…some people. But I like my behavior to be such that they don’t have much ammunition.
I don’t think she said you have to care. She said that she cares and it bothers her and she doesn’t want to foster it. She is not harming you by not wanting to foster it and she does not need to justify not wanting to foster it.
First, Anaamika: thank you. You expressed exactly how I feel. I am not concerned about how my carefully selected friends (who also happen to be coworkers) feel. They are friends for a reason. I have also heard the gossip, rumor-mongering, speculation about who is sleeping with whom and everyone just “knows” it because he’s seen at her desk when he should be working! They were spotted at Burger Moe’s together and … doesn’t he have a wife? I saw him give her a longing glance!
Yes, it is petty and immature behavior, but it exists and it would be unwise to ignore it, and take reasonable steps to insulate yourself from it, unless you’re not particularly ambitious. You’ll never be told that the reason you didn’t get that lateral transfer or promotion is because hiring manager heard it from a “good source” that you make “questionable” choices.
The “shit” that people talk about me, what I can’t reasonably anticipate or have any control over … that’s fine. I can control this. I can choose who I socialize with 1-1, and where that happens. I have no problem with going out for a quick bite at lunchtime with a male coworkers; I have in the past, and will do so with this guy as well. It’s a different setting altogether.
Finally, I agree that the word “BAR” shouldn’t automatically equate to “ILLICIT HOOK-UP!!!” … but it does. That’s the reality we live with. At least in my small little corner of the world.
I think that’s a very good response.
You said you’re probably not giving him enough credit, Tracijo, but I think you’re reading the situation accurately. You like him, he likes you - even if there isn’t an attraction there, spending a lot of time together one-on-one is how attraction is built in a lot of cases. Not spending a lot of time together one-on-one is how you stay professional co-workers who like and respect each other (with healthy, intact marriages). 
The weird thing here is not that he invited you, but that he is clueless about what repeated rejections mean.
If you want to find out what is going on, invite him for lunch. That is work and social unlike a purely social happy hour. And no booze. But there is nothing wrong with just continuing to politely say no either.
Must be a nice world where you get to pick your coworkers. And all of your neighbors, and friends of friends, and the parents of the kids in your kid’s class, and the people you go to church with, and…Hell, one of DoctorJ’s patients announced in the middle of a visit that they didn’t know he was going out with one of our female friends. And every time I explain that no, they’re just friends people take on that cloying sweet and understanding “the wife is always the last to know” tone of voice as they commiserate with me about how awful and narrow-minded people can be. (And I guarantee you that when they repeat the tale, they’ll give full tongue to how awful it is for someone to be so deluded.) It gets really, really embarrassing after a while.
Not embarrassing enough that I would ask him to stop going places with this friend, but embarrassing enough that I’m not particularly sad she’s moved away. I miss her and all, but if I said my life wasn’t a little easier and more enjoyable without this stuff, I’d be a lying liar telling lies. I also can’t say it didn’t raise an eyebrow when I told him she’d announced to apropos of not much that she never wore underwear and he said, “Oh, she told me that a long time ago.”
Precisely. Also, when someone is talking about crossing some boundary they never even considered the possibility of crossing, I never hear them say “We were both a bit full” or “We were both a bit caffeinated.” But “We were both a bit drunk” is so common it’s a cliche.
I have a hard time believing Jane Doe didn’t get that promotion because the manager ‘heard’ she’s boinking so-n-so. Especially if Jane Doe does exceptional work.
Heck, WRT the rumor mill, damn near any time an attractive or even half way attractive women gets a promotion, you’ll always hear the rumor that she’s f’ing someone. That’s way messed up, but there ya’ have it.
That said, I still don’t blame any one for having their boundaries.
It doesn’t have to be embarrassing, false, or even loaded with “husband” bombs.
How’s about:
Replace “our department” with whatever collective noun is appropriate to describe the group you guys sometimes hang with after work.
This has the added benefit that, if he IS trying to tell you something, he will probably just say so at that point.
No. “MOTEL 6” automatically equates to “ILLICIT HOOK-UP!!!”, which really isn’t fair either. I mean I explained to my husband that we were just shootin’ the shit about work and stuff.
I have actually shared my hopes and dreams over lunch.
Conversely, I have also had idle chit chat in a bar and left.
So, yeah, anyway…just tell him you’re not interested in setting foot inside a bar with him (skip the whole “hopes and dreams” thing) and that should be the end of it.
“You are a cool guy and a great coworker, don’t get me wrong. But it would be inappropriate for us to meet alone outside of our work environment”.
If he truly has no untoward motives, there is no way he would be offended or take this the wrong way. And if he does, well there you go. 
It happens. A lot. Managers and directors are just as human, and as prone to petty gossip and speculation, as the rest of us. I have seen this very thing happen. Not so much with frontline staff but most certainly within the ranks of management. And I was invite into that circle after 8 careful years of managing my own performance — both the work itself, and the image that I present to others. One very recent example: a female worker with an exceptional reputation as a “rock star” was rejected in our pool of candidates because one manager shared her concerns about rumors involving this worker and another (married) male worker while away at a conference. She was careful to say that her “concerns” were that they weren’t where they should have been during a workday at a conference. I was actually at that same conference. People were giddy with breathless gossip that she hadn’t returned to her hotel room one night, that they were seen renting a boat together during th conference, etc.
Every last one of us sitting in that room knew beyond a doubt that it wasn’t about two people out fishing together on the government dime while attending a conference at a resort. Half the people who attended that conference missed more presentations than they attended, and this is routine at every conference, government sponsored or no.
And I’m sure at that meeting you spoke right up and said so, right?
Well, everyone knows that going to conferences just leads to sharing your hopes and dreams, your fears, your aspirations…then all the sudden you’re naked. Just like a bar.