First Crush

Do you remember your first crush? Not your first love, but your first crush. A little heart flutter was all it amounted to, but it was fun. Fun for boys and girls. I can remember my cousin’s first crush. She was a pre-teen. Here’s the story.
We lived in the country. My parent’s were strict Christians and always followed the rules. There was a lady that went to our church that had several children and was relatively happy I thought, except that her husband never went to church with her, just her children.
One day we found out that her husband left her. Now I don’t know whose idea that was, hers or his. Regardless this lady had children to raise on her own.
One day she called my parents and told them that she was having trouble with her oldest son and wondered if my mom and dad would keep him over the summer to see if he would “shape up”. My mom and dad discussed it and decided that they would give it a try.
Dad had him help him do chores and taught him a lot about farming and following the rules about work ethic. He was often found under a shade tree.
My mother taught him a lot about following the rules also, but was a bit sharper with him with the more personal side of his life, hygiene, manners at the table and with older adults, etc.
Well, my eleven year old cousin and her dad came to visit. I think that she came for the summer. Oh my goodness, her eyes just sparkled when she took one look at this good looking blonde curly haired young man. I think he was about fourteen or fifteen. He often wore overalls with no shirt. Wow, you could just see in her eyes that something was wrong. He had been living with us for some time so I wasn’t the least bit interested and I thought she was goofy.
She kept telling me things like “Did you see that he looked at me!” and so on.
I had not seen or heard from my cousin since my sister died several years ago until just recently. One of the first things she mentioned was, did I remember this young man. You never forget your first crush even if it was like this young man and thought that my cousin was just a nuisance. He would be about seventy now, I wonder if he remembers my cousin, it would be interesting to know, wouldn't it?