thank you golden_eve for your feedback. So he wrote back that being friends is ok with him. I felt we had no chance to be friends if everything from his side is an angle for 'more' and I am feeling pressured. That would be stringing him along and could also result in very hurt feelings.

I have had good friendships with men before. We'll see what happens.

There were a couple of other things that bothered me. One was that he criticized me for wearing the same outfit (almost the same) twice in a row rather than changing and asked me if I was depressed. Well it is valid that I am depressed and it's a symptom of depression in women to not vary their wardrobe as much as they would otherwise but I thought this was kind of intrusive... then he followed later saying not to think of my depression and then I won't be depressed.. basically I could talk myself out of it.