Camp Counselor Crush

Camp Counselor Crush

     Summer in New Orleans was artichokes dipped in sour cream, plantains ripening in the backyard, and ready to be fried by Mom in a skillet to sweeten my boyish tongue with tropical flavors that summoned the Tarzan in my heart. When Mom baked baklava in the oven the scent was as sweet as the smile of the ladies who strolled the streets of the neighborhood on their evening walks wearing scarves like the Turkish maidens in the pictures from the village of Yalova on the shores of the Sea of Marmara that I only saw in slides from my Dad’s projector.
     There I nearly took my first breath and opened my eyes to the light of day had my parents not decided for me to emerge from the womb in Mississippi so far even from this city that care forgot where I roamed the streets falling in love with the crescent city of my heart. The city was my Creole bride whose dusky exhalations I breathed like perfume from a Caribbean shore.
     But this was no ordinary morning when I rubbed the sleep from my eyes and heard the bouzouki music from the Isle of Patmos played by Dad on his phonograph as he straightened his tie for work. Mom cooked up a batch of beignets for breakfast and my taste buds heartily agreed with her choice.
     I knew the secret to my boyish joy this morning that the guardians of my little heart had not a clue of. Today I was getting hitched if only in my imagination. My bride was no ghost of the silver screen but rather a living and breathing woman who waited at summer camp for me to ring and wed if only for a few minutes long enough to spice my boyhood heart. But my experience of maiden charm would not be limited to a fictional bride.  
     Before the charm of her was bestowed I would travel to Europe via a slide projector with stewardesses to serve the refreshments to whet my appetite for tying a make believe knot with the princess whose merest touch could turn a frog like me into a prince.
     As a ten-year-old boy, I went to summer camp at the Jewish Community Center on St Charles Ave. Our pretend plane trip over Europe was 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.
     Through my glassy eyes, I saw the truth of my life that unfolded like the images of Paris whose French ambiance I was no stranger to in this city where the scent of baguettes fresh from the oven followed me on my visits to the store known as Langensteins on Arabella Street where even more foreign vibes greeted me on the tombstones of the Jewish graveyard whose Polish names sounded musical as they rolled across my childish tongue in my garbled pronunciations.
     Then I went to the gym.  There we had our pretend marriage ceremony.   I was given a ring and put it on the finger of a beautiful blonde woman.  She was my wife for a while.  I felt I loved her and was excited to be married. She was pretty 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.
     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. Would faith be enough to sustain me in the lonely years ahead?
     Mom met me in the lobby of this building designed like a wave. She smiled and took my small hand in hers. I grinned like it was my birthday and I had just opened the present whose gift was beyond my childish reckoning but made my heart thump as the groom to a woman if only in my mind.
     “You sure look happy today. How was your flight to Europe, my world traveler?”
     “Mom to be honest Europe didn’t enchant me as much as my first taste of romance.”
      “Oh my, my son has a crush on a girl. Who is this Lass that charmed my lucky boy?”
     “Well, she is taller than me but I will grow.”
     “I bet you’ll be taller than me one day. My how the years fly by.”
     “Can I be like Peter Pan and never grow old?”
      “You will always be my ‘little Greek ghost boy’ no matter what. It is about time for the rerun of Star Trek that I know you won’t want to miss because this is the episode in which Spock inhales the spores that make him sing and fall in love.”
     “I like Spock the way he is.”
     “Even logicians fall in love.”
     “But Mom, what if I am too timid for women?”
     “Without saying a word Chaplin charmed women everywhere. Your shyness will draw them like bees to honey.”