So What's the Worst Crush You Ever Had?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

So I’m a bartender at a neighborhood bar. As a female bartender I get my fair share of come-ons/phone numbers/ribald remarks, etc., all of which I take in stride as part of my job description.

But one of my co-workers and also one of my regulars told me that Regular X–let’s call him Alex–has a big ol’ crush on me. And it makes me a little bit sad/sorry.

Alex is a very nice guy. Immature but a sincere, sweet low-maintenance guy…good tipper when he has the money…always offers to buy everyone drinks, including me…I’ve known him for several years but he broke up with his girlfriend a year ago and since then I guess I’ve made an appearance on his radar. I knew this before I was informed of it because of the way I’d catch him staring at me.

According to my co-worker he’s said that he knows I have a serious boyfriend but he just can’t help thinking that I’m the coolest/hottest/most awesome girl in the world, and “if I just went on a date with him…”

And something about his very blatant, obvious crush on me took me back to those times when I had that same kind of crush on someone.

The kind of crush where you think about them all the time, and you get all giddy and fluttery when you see them, and you feel like an idiot when you actually speak to them because you’re so enamored you can’t string a sentence together…

It’s the most intoxicating and annoying sensation in the world. You can’t help yourself. You know it’s absurd and will probably never amount to anything but that’s part of the charm of it; you just can’t stop yourself.

I’ve been on both ends of the scenario.

Alex will never get anywhere with me; I never got anywhere with most of my crushes. But that didn’t stop them from happening. Part of the appeal was probably the improbability of it actually going anywhere. And I wonder if the objects of my infatuation felt the way I do about Alex. Like, “Oh dear, how sweet…how flattering…how unfortunate…”

Because you always think that when you have a crush on someone that they aren’t aware of it…but chances are pretty good that you’re being far more obvious than you realize.

So I want to ask for Crush Stories. Whether you were the object of the crush, or the one crushing. How did it end? How bad did it get? What stupid things did you do while under the spell of it? If you were on the other end, how sympathetic were you about it?

Did it ever have a happy ending? Did The Crush ever come to fruition? If it didn’t, what ended it?

And do you have any regrets?

2

During my senior year in High School, we got some new neighbors: a single mom and her two college-age daughters. The youngest daughter was a year older than me and the oldest was almost four years older. I knew them from High School but we’d never really been friends.

That changed when we became neighbors. Both of the girls were very outgoing and would speak if they saw me outside or ask for a hand moving something heavy or ask me to go to the store with them after dark.

I eventually started crushing on the older daughter, Amanda. She was smart. She was pretty. She was funny. She was in college! (For the record, the younger daughter was all of these things too but something about the older girl had me.)

Amanda was nearly finished with college and already had a boyfriend. She also went to school out of town and was only home once or twice a month. Somewhere in my head, I knew it was hopeless but I continued mooning over her for most of a year.

Looking back, it’s embarrassing to think of how I acted around her. I was crushing hard and could barely have a conversation without sounding like an idiot. We all exchanged gifts and I spent way more time and money on gifts to her than to her sister and mother. It must have been obvious to her what was going on. She never said a word though.

Nothing ever came of it and naturally I got over my crush.

In an interesting twist, during my senior year of college she came to her mom’s house for a visit and I just happened to be working out in the yard. I was long since over my crush and was already dating my wife by then. I actually managed to have a conversation with her and didn’t trip all over myself. We chatted about her job and my upcoming graduation.

A couple of weeks later, a mutual friend called me up. He wanted to know what I’d said to Amanda when she’d come home the last time. He told me that she’d been talking about me non-stop and had been wondering aloud if I was dating anyone. Apparently the tables had turned.

Nothing ever came of that either.

3

I have to preface this with the fact that I’m very happy in my relationship, I have no desire to cheat, lie to him or hurt him and I would never act on this, but there is this guy…

I met him on an online forum about 7 years ago and and he’s this jaw-dropping combination of a brilliant technical mind, a mastery of just about every ‘guy’ trade that there is, a sharp and and quick sense of humor and the ability to cut through all sorts of BS, but all with an underlying kindness that kept it from being mean. And he’s hot. Sight unseen, devastatingly, weak at the knees kind of hot. And he’s married. I’m not single either.

We both know that we’re never going to act on this, don’t want to mess up either of our lives and we’re old and practical enough to know that tossing away a family and home life on a crush is just stupid and we aren’t the type to lie and have affairs. So, we flirt and tease and dance around it having fun for a while, then it gets a bit too intense and we decide we better back off, then we start again and on and on. Right now I haven’t talked to him in almost a year because the line between fun flirting and cheating was getting kind of thin and the forum we hung out on imploded.

I don’t regret it because there really is no ‘it’ to regret. My partner and I talked about online flirting and crushes years ago and decided that it’s all in fun and doesn’t matter as long as it doesn’t get carried away, I’d never choose the crush over him and our life.

4

I had a major crush for about 10 years, through college and my first marriage. I fell for her at my first job in college, where, unfortunately for me, I did not have many romantic interests. So there wasn’t much else to fixate on.

She did everything to sustain it. She was very physically affectionate–a lot of touching, resting her legs and arms on me, even letting me cuddle her in bed on Saturday mornings. We were very close friends, which of course made things all the worse for me. Finally I couldn’t take it and made a move on her, which she let progress to a certain point, then stopped it. We somehow moved beyond that with the understanding that the friendship was too important, yadda yadda yadda.

Years later, right before graduation, out of the blue she kissed me, apologizing afterwards that the sexual tension that night was driving her crazy, but, again, nothing could happen. At my first wedding, we were talking and she looks around and says to me, “Next time around, we’ll do this.” (Yes, dumb to invite her, but keep in mind we were still very close friends)

Years later, during my divorce (during her first marriage), I tell her if she’s ever single, I’m going to court her, or some jibberish to that extent. She says she’d like to get to know me in that way.

A while later, after my divorce, I’m on deployment and make an overseas call to her. We catch up, and out of the blue, she says coyly that she’s fallen in love with someone and that she’s pretty sure he’s in love with her, too. I’m too stunned to speak.

Those few seconds, when my mind was racing with giddy excitement, was the peak of my relationship with her. Because after that, when she continued that it was some guy she’d just met, it was all downhill (I’m just thankful I didn’t say anything–how embarrassing and awkward that would have been). I started slowly realizing how much pain this girl brought into my life.

I came back to the States and started dating an old flame of mine, and she (aware of my crush) told me I needed to sort that out before I got any further with her. And I was finally in the frame of mind where I could see that she was right. So, I drove many hours to the crush’s house, sat down with her, and asked her if the dating thing would ever be a reality. She said no, so that was that. I ended it (which sounds strange when talking about a friendship). Best thing I’ve ever done for myself.

She felt bitterly betrayed, I think, which is sad, but under the circumstances, I didn’t much care. The only way for me to get on with my life was to either date her, or remove her from my life. I’ve realized, over the ensuing years, that I was her safety blanket. It infuriates me to think how naive and stupid I was, and how much time I wasted pining for her. And I see the same thing from a lot of posts here–guys who are besotted with the same kind of girl. I feel very bad for them, because I know what’s coming.

5

The most hopeless crush I’ve had was probably on a young teacher in high school. He was married. I knew his wife. They had kids. He was a really good dresser though…

6

Fourth grade. His name was Brian. I was hopelessly in luuuuurve and he was reeeeaaaally not interested. The crush lasted till he moved away in eighth grade.

7

It was love at first sight with this girl. Man was I ever bummed when I learned that was taken in 1941.

8

Two teachers in high school, one prof at university, and various dreamy boys in both high school and university. Crushes are *strong *when you’re young.

Currently I have a crush on Todd the Plumber, but it’s much less intense and just fun. I’m happily married but enjoy my little crushes.

I might be developing a serious crush on Jason O’Mara from Life on Mars and Jon Stewart, too.

There are so many yummy men out there in this world to enjoy vicariously.

9

I had a crush on a doctor I worked with. I knew there was never a chance. He was married, I was married, but I’m sure I turned scarlet every time I tried to talk with him.

There was a kid, when I was in Jr. High, who used to come to the house and hang out with my younger brother. I didn’t find out until years later that he came because he wanted to see me. He grew up to be an incredibly handsome, but hopelessly alcoholic, loser. :>(

10

For a while there I had a huge random crush on one of the counter clerks at the local video rental place nearest me. It didn’t help that my wife continued to egg me on. I mean, fortunately it was an adult-crush, so I could chat coherently when she made clerk small talk about what I was renting.

Oh well, the video store closed. I see her wandering around with her apparent boyfriend at the mall or supermarket once in a blue moon. So it goes.

Life wouldn’t be as much fun without these little fantasies, the dark side that flyboy describes nonwithstanding.

11

Wow.

I had this one happen. I was hopelessly in love with the sister of a friend of mine. Talked with her every day, couldn’t keep her out of my mind… and she returned the attention, and I convinced myself it was because she had these same feelings for me, too.

And then one night we’re on the phone, talking until the wee hours as we often did, and she tells me she’s finally gotten the courage to tell this guy she loves how she feels. And my heart stops. Wow, I feel it too! I’m yours! I …

…uh… wish you the best of luck in telling Jeff how you feel. Yeah. Great. Good luck with that, all right.

Grrr.

12

There was a girl a year behind me. I first noticed her when I was in eighth grade and she was in seventh.

She played flute. I played clarinet, and I never actually learned anything about music because I spent the entire class every day floating about a foot above my chair, gazing longingly across to the flute section. The band director probably thought I was really, really weird. (“Is this freak of a kid staring at me, or over there?”)

This continued all the way through my senior year. Never had a cojones to act on it. Or even talk to her. In fact, my entire chest cavity liquefied every time she so much as cast those baby blues toward my half of the room.

I think she liked trombone players. And I’m pretty sure I wrote something really stupid in her yearbook my senior year. Yeah, I probably did. I may have blotted that particular episode from my memory.

Good times.

13

I wasted 10th grade crushing extremely hard on a girl whom I didn’t have the balls to tell. I was so infatuated that I would literally feel pain and get nauseous when I looked at her. When South Park came out a couple years later I could totally relate to Stan puking every time he saw Wendy. By the time I got around to making it obvious I was way too deep into friend territory. Farthest I ever got was spooning with her one night at her house and feeling a boob under the pretense of “feeling her heartbeat” :rolleyes::o:p.

14

I crushed on a boy in Jr. High for about a year before his family moved out of town. They moved back my sophomore year of high school and my crush was assigned the seat right in front of me in one of my classes. He spent the year chatting with me whenever he could get away with it. He was my friend and he had no clue about my crush. It was bad. I got the sped up heart and the sweaty hands every time he said hello. I crushed on that boy for two years before I managed to pull myself out of it.

I saw him again about five years ago. It was like Pavlov’s dogs; my physical reaction to him was the same. Which was weird because intellectually there was no draw to him anymore and my husband of 10 years was standing by my side the whole time.

15

In grade ten, I met this gorgeous Japanese-Canadian girl. Smart, beautiful, straight A’s in physics, cheerleader… I crushed hard on her in grade ten. And part of grade eleven, except that then there was another Japanese-Canadian girl I had a smaller crush on, and she had the locker next to mine. But then grade 12 rolled around and it was back to crushing on the first girl. And she was in my physics class. And then there was grade 13… it was hopeless.

I had no dates when I was in high school. I was not attractive. I went to the senior prom by myself. There wasn’t a lot to distract me from these crushes.

I met her at the 150th anniversary of the school, which was kind of like a 15-year high-school reunion, and admitted that I’d had the biggest crush on her. She thought that was ‘sweet’, and talked about her happy life married and living in Michigan.

16

I was eighteen and working at the local renfaire, when I fell and fell hard for one of the merchants there (she worked in a booth selling flower garlands). She and I flirted very hard (a first, and, sadly, last for me) even though she told me she had a significant other. At the end of the season, she was my first ever kiss. I saw her once after that, and then never again. I’ll certainly not forget her.

17

From The Onion: Totally Hot Chick Also Way Psycho

Also in the same vein: Romantic-Comedy Behavior Gets Real-Life Man Arrested

Stranger

18

I think I know that girl…hell, i think i know SEVERAL of that girl.

I’m too young to not find the embarrassing crushes of my youth to be…embarrassing. Ask again in 10 years.

19

I crushed real hard on this girl in eighth and ninth grades. She sat near me in eighth grade French class, that’s how I met her. She was nice enough to me but was otherwise not at all interested.

One day her father was driving her to school and the passed me as I was waiting for the bus, so they stopped to pick me up and give me a ride. I sat beside her and thought I was in heaven.

But here’s the really strange thing about that period in my life, as I look back on it (it’s now thirty years gone by). At the same time that I must have been totally obvious in my feelings for this girl, I was constantly being picked on and teased by many of the boys for being “gay”. It didn’t occur to me at the time, but now, looking back, didn’t they see I couldn’t have been gay since I was constantly mooning about this girl?

Anyway, all that changed when we moved away from Montreal to Los Angeles.

Ed

20

Wow, how did you get through adolescence without learning that young boys calling you gay doesn’t really mean that they think you are a homosexual?