How to set up interactions with someone you are interested in after long time without contact?

Question

I am a 20 y/o guy and I would like to spend time with a particularly nice girl who I only saw occasionally and it has been 6 months since the last time.

Past interactions

These have always been because of a mutual group of friends. My friends are friends with hers and so occasionally if there is a group cinema outing, party and once there was a picnic to watch a band play at the park, it is mostly just at these times that I see her. Now to be clear we have never been particularly close, I would estimate there were only 8 or so days spent together and they were spread out over a a year, ending 6 months ago. However in the latter half particularly, I would find myself spending the entire day chatting with her happily.

Current standing

Due to a combination of our friend groups shifting, and myself going from somewhat unsocial to non-existant after suddenly spending 50h weeks at a new programming job as opposed to the 5h I used to, we have not had any interaction at all in 6ish months. I have intended to contact her before this point via facebook, pushing friends to help or even "subtly :D" dropping into her work but the prospect made me quite anxious as I didn't know what to say and then next minute it's been 6 months.

Options

Enlisting help from a mutual friend in order to invite us both to a group event will no longer work as there was an awkward falling between the main two who connected our friend groups (not related to me, the girl or this question).

Edit: It does not have anything to do with me but I feel that in her friends' eyes I could be related to the situation, even if its only by association with the friend with whom they had the falling out with. This makes reconnecting with her friends in this group a whole separate question that I am not as worried about since we were on good terms, but I do think it should be done only after first reconnecting with the one who I am by far, the closest to. end edit.

Now, my current goal is to merely meet up and have a chance to reconnect/spend time but I think it has probably gone too long that to try and ask for something casual will be weird enough anyway so I might as well be more direct than in usual cases. I was thinking of using facebook to send a message along these lines:

Hi, I received two free tickets to this cool new movie. Is there any chance you would be interested in coming? I was thinking we could go grab some food from this place beforehand or something?

Either that or give up to the off chance we meet again. Does anyone have some answer for how to tactfully approach this situation to result in a good chance in spending time together?/Finding out if she even wants to spend time since there is a significant possibility I misread her signals and she has no interest in meeting me.

For reference, she is 20 and my ultimate goal is a long term relationship. But lets just start with meeting up for now.

Answer 1

"Hey, I'm going shopping this weekend for socks. Wanna come?"

It's as easy as that. Do your own thing, invite her to join you. It doesn't have to be a 'date' or anything like it, just an opportunity to spend time together. If she's interested, she'll say yes. If not, and she doesn't seem interested in arranging a different opportunity, drop it.

The basis for this suggestion comes from various sources including "The Selfish Gene" by Richard Dawkins. You should probably also read the wiki page for "Behavioural Genetics."

Ultimately, the behavior recommended in my above answer is a distillation of several concepts in the sited references, as well as other sources. The theory is to exhibit as many 'universally attractive' behaviors as possible. These would include:

• self confidence
• congruence
• leading a self-directed life
• independence
• being involved living your own life
• not being approval-seeking

The first paragraph encompasses many of these ideals and is quite simple to implement. Obviously, the girl in the OP would have to have no worse than a neutral feeling toward the OP poster.

Answer 2

Yeah, your invitation there looks like asking her out for a date, which she may not appreciate right out of the blue.

I'd go with a softer approach

Hey, it's been ages since I saw you, a lot has happened, and I have loads to tell you. We should catch up sometime soon!

And see what response you get and move onwards from there.

Obviously, you need to put a little work into seeing if she's romantically involved with anyone else before you start out.

Answer 3

You wrote:

I would find myself spending the entire day chatting with her happily

And also:

it has probably gone too long that to try and ask for something casual will be weird enough

I disagree. It sounded like the two of you were reasonable friends back then. Anecdotally, I have friends who I hadn't seen for a good 6 or 7 years or so. When I happened to be in the right part of the country to see them, I sent them a quick message along the lines of:

Hi, I know it's been a while, but I'm going to be around ${place} from ${start_time} to ${end_time} and was wondering if you'd like to meet up, catch up, and do ${thing}

I met up, reconnected with old friends, and had a wonderful time with them over tea. Apparently, save for facial hair, I hadn't changed at all. It is 100% fine to reach out to old friends to see if they'd like to meet up.

That said, a few things really did jump out at me from your question:

it's been 6 months

...

my ultimate goal is a long term relationship

Do you think you might be getting ahead of yourself a bit? You've spent some time with this person, and that's great, but deciding you want a long term relationship with someone you've not seen for six months strikes me as a little bit speedy. I mean, what if she's taken up boat-programming in those intervening six months, when you absolutely hate boat-progammers and everything they stand for?

You're a grown man and I'm not going to tell you what you do and don't want. Maybe you have genuinely decided that you definitely want an LTR with this person, but I don't really think you've quite gotten enough information to make that kind of decision just yet.

Asking to meet up is fine, and being intersted in people romantically is also fine, but be honest with yourself about what your connection currently looks like. They're an old friend, you'd like to reconnect with them, so go do that. If you later find that you're getting close and you'd like to start turning the connection into something different, then it might be time to start following the advice in Kate Gregory's answer to this question.

Answer 4

I have a feeling that you would prefer to speak with her not that straightforward about the meeting up. What about just texting her that yesterday you saw her somewhere and ask was it her? You can say that you saw her in the shopping center but she was on the other end of a shopping center and you tried to say hello but she did not see you.

I know it sounds strange but it would be kind of random message with which you can start a conversation.