Crush

A friend recently told me that it was importance for him to have a crush on another person for him to consider something more serious like love and relationship.

Crush can be defined as an overwhelming sense of attraction and admiration, mostly physical, but it can be some other attribute that one so idolizes and/or idealizes in another person. My definition of crush is instantaneous attraction; yun ang ultimate crush para sa akin.

I started having crushes waaaay back when I was just in grade school. And take note, most of my childhood crushes were of the opposite sex. Some of them I can still vividly remember.

There was Margarita (Rica, for short), a half Spanish beauty with her jet black hair, curly lashes, fair complexion, shy smile, and sleepy-puppy dog eyes. I had the distinct opportunity of sitting next to her in grade 1 class. Then there was Leslie, a combination of beauty and brains. Bibsy (her nickname) was a consistent honor student. We were in the same class for four years or so since we belonged to the honor’s class. There was Lilia, the tall, intelligent, sporty girl. She was a member of the school’s volleyball varsity team. What really caught me was her sunny disposition and sense of humor. I still had my crush on her even when I was in high school. I’d pick her up from her house on the way to school since she lived right beside it. When I think about it now, we could have become an “item” if I had only pursued.

The others were really just passing fancies: Lucille, one of the great grand nieces of the wife of a well-loved former president; Ms. Guzman, our freshman math teacher; Mrs. Jaramillo, our senior math teacher (do you see a trend here or what?).

During those times I kinda knew that I was also attracted to the same sex. It's just that I didn't pay too much attention. For somehow I knew it's not supposed to be. At that time, I haven’t completely grasped the concept of being gay or bisexual.

I can only remember 2 guys in high school. One is John, a really cute, soft-spoken bass player in our rondalla band. He was “silent waters run deep” type. John would always sit quietly in his corner to study his scores during rehearsal, and he would be spanking when he played the bass. I remember hanging out near him under the pretense of trying to learn the bass (which I did, eventually). And there was that professional basketball player mentioned in one of my previous blog entries.

The hallowed halls of College were a different story. Call it a heightened sense of maturity, but I had very few crushes then. But it was there where I met Teresita.

She was this petite, cute, and extremely smart Chinese girl who graduated from Colegio San Agustin. It was instantaneous attraction. She was no outstanding beauty but she had this sweet and unassuming image that I found adorable and irresistible. And so did half of the other guys in the Engineering honor’s class. Ha ha. I did try to get close to her during the first two months of class. One problem, whenever I have a huge crush, I instantly become a blithering idiot. No words would come out of my mouth and my mind would be blank. And so, it was happy contentment just looking at her, especially her cheery smile that made her eyes sparkle. Slowly but surely, though, I did get close to her. I’d have lunch with her and her friends; I’d join their group as we walked to the next class; we’d have long talks when she was waiting for her ride. It helped that one of her close friends was my high school classmate. Later that year, I mustered enough courage to tell her how I felt. But it wasn’t meant to be. She was Chinese, and I was not. After that confession, she started to distance herself from me. Suffice to say that it was the first time that I had my heart truly broken. It was the first time I cried about someone. It was the first time I fell in love.

I really do not know if there is such a thing as rightness or wrongness in acting out on one's crush. Chances are, one may mistake it for love, or in other instances, the basis for love and relationship. It is true that in a way, this is the impetus that makes one act to lead it into possible romance and relationship. But sometimes, if not most of the time, relationships that start this way can get stuck in this level and may never go past beyond what is supposedly idealized and move on to the practical, more sensible and more enduring part of the relationship.

I still get to have crushes. I have acted on some of them, but others remained at that, just a crush. And definitely this is one spice of life that will always be welcome in my life.

Anyway, I have learned my lessons: crush is my impulse of attraction. But I have to see past that for me to really say that what I feel is love.