Camp Counselor Crush

Camp Counselor Crush

    When I lived in New Orleans with my family as a child,  I went to summer camp at the Jewish Community Center on St Charles Ave.  One day they had a special program.  They had a pretend plane trip over Europe using a slide show.  We all sat around a large room in chairs, looking at slides of the Parthenon, the Eiffel Tower, London Bridge, etc and teenage girls walked around in stewardess outfits serving us pastries and grape juice.  I felt really high from all the attention. It felt like a window had opened through which I could glimpse my future.
     Then I went to the gym.  There we had a pretend marriage ceremony.   I was given a ring and put it on the finger of a young woman.  She was my wife for a while.  I felt I loved her and was excited to be married. She was beautiful and sweet and I stood gawking at her.  
     My little boy blues ebbed. Her sun queen radiance penetrated me. I peered into her eyes which were warm and inviting. Timidly I entered her womanly aura. She reached out to me in my darkness. Her touch, soft as rose petals, sparked me at contact.
   Then her real boyfriend came and led her out into the hall, raising his voice and arguing with her.
     I shadowed them in hot pursuit to protect her from him.  As I entered the hall I took a spill on the freshly mopped floor and fell on my behind.  She helped me up, my virgin heart christened by her indelible love touch.
     I was really embarrassed.  I felt like a kid once more, because I realized that the marriage was pretend and she really wasn’t interested in me as a boyfriend.
     My little male ego was bruised, but there would be other women I told myself. Still, sometimes I wondered who could or would love me?  Would I be alone when I got older? Somehow it would work out.  “What will be will be, the future’s not ours to see,” as Doris Day said. But would faith be enough to sustain me in the lonely years ahead?