First Crush, Please Respond

Whereas some people didn’t develop romantic feelings for the opposite gender until puberty struck, I can recall having crushes as early as 3 and 4 years of age.

My very fist crush was none other than LeVar Burton, host of Reading Rainbow. I remember being very distraught and confused when I saw him playing his other famous TV character: blind Lieutenant Geordi La Forge on Star Trek.

In real life, my first crush was Carl Huntington. We went to preschool together. Rather than having a sandbox, our preschool had a huge crate of corn kernels that we played in. I distinctly remember plotting ways to lure Carl into the corn crate with me with the intention of kissing him. You may ask, what turned my affections off for young Carl? Well, quite simply, one day he wore a tight white turtleneck to school. During story time, I noticed that while sitting Indian style, Carl had quite the belly rolls (at four years old, I believe this is called ‘baby fat’), nonetheless, this turned me off to dear Carl.

This story is quite infamous in my household. In fact, when Scott and I got married, in an act of jest, my sister, Ann, constructed a wedding card for me. On the front was a magazine clipping of a man in a tight white turtleneck. Ann had glued Scott’s picture over the model’s face and drawn an arrow to his midsection. She wrote, “Hey look, no belly rolls!” And on the inside, “So now you can happily walk down the aisle and say ‘I do.’

Okay, I digress a little with the story. My true intention for this blog post is to discover who was your first crush? Other really stellar crushes in my past include:

-Prince Erik from the Little Mermaid (yeah, the cartoon character)
-The axe throwing hottie, Sully, from Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman
-Huck Finn, as played by Elijah Wood

It's a little bit funny, this feeling inside . . .

Like a queasiness, or a mild indigestion.

I couldn’t resist watching clips from yesterdays, “Michael Jackson: The Memorial.”

I realize that he was a musical prodigy. That he blazed the trail into musical superstardom, which few, if any will ever be able to coincide or surpass.

That said, am I the only one that he gave the hybee-geebies?

Queen Latifah read a poem composed by the esteemed Maya Angelou, which seemed to liken him to an angel, granted to earth for only a short while.

Here’s an excerpt:

“Though we are many, each of us is achingly alone, piercingly alone.
Only when we confess our confusion can we remember that he was a gift to us and we did have him. “

And

“We were enchanted with his passion because he held nothing. He gave us all he had been given.”

Okay, give me a moment to choke down my gag reflex.

In my opinion, Michael Jackson may have been a musical God, but he was still a frail, very disturbed human being.

I may listen to his songs, smile and reminisce, but I will not mourn this man.