Not everyone had shown up yet and I was eager to see who the rest of the staff would be. It is interesting to meet a people when you know you will be stuck with them in the mountains for practically 9 weeks straight. It changes perceptions a bit. Well a new male head counselor arrived right after lunch and I am pretty sure most of the girls had the same reaction I did.
Hi.
We all got a little bit giggly which girls are wont to do up in the mountains when they know they will be stuck with a cute boy for 9 weeks. He was the brother of a returning counselor, Lyndall (normally Amy), who has been described as mother theresa. She is an extremely kind, likable person. She often plays mother as well to all of the younger staff. Well, we were all pretty excited to meet her brother. I decided right then and there that this was my guy. He was the guy that I had always imagined dating. So I set out on my most flirtatious behavior.
Lyndall’s brother Joe, gained the name Smalls and he headed out with his fellow male head counselors Tejas (typical high school boy) and Mongoose (beach blonde intriguing jock) to play some basketball.Us girls instictively followed to watch and cheer and…flirt. While walking to the basketball court Twiggy explained to me that she knew Tejas and Mongoose. She gave me low down.
They had just graduated high school and were off to college at Central Washington University. Tejas was a ladies man and Mongoose, well Mongoose was an egotistical jerk. He thought he was so smart, so funny, and so athletic. She told me that he was good at track but was awful at basketball. She was mainly coming to watch him be awful at playing basketball. She seemed to get a lot of joy out of the fact that he would be so bad. Well it was nice to get some inside scoop on the boy with yellow hair but really I was there for Smalls.
Now I am not your typical flirt. It’s not because I have a better method or anything, I just don’t really know how to do it without being obnoxious. To me, flirting is yelling and screaming and drawing as much attention to myself as possible. So my plan for flirting with Smalls? To focus my attention on another boy in attempts to get him to notice how witty and fun I am. This entailed me pointing out that everything single thing Mongoose did during his basketball game was track related. It mostly sounded like this, “Wow! That was a track shot,” “Did you see that track hop?” “Look a track dribble.” Obnoxious right?
Did it grab their attention? Yes.
So for their entire game I continued to focus on Mongoose. At first he thought it was cute and funny and then he got kinda annoyed. I didn’t really care though because Smalls was laughing and I had accomplished in my mind what I set out to do. I was cute and funny and a little bit daring.
Even though I was seemingly directing my flirtation at Smalls. I caught Mongoose’s attention. After the game he came up to me and told me I was a little bit crazy. I looked at him and told him, “You are crazier.” He quipped back, “Well, you are crazy on a stick!” and my heart skipped a beat. His smile. That smile. It moved something inside of me that I didn’t even recognize at the time. But after that night my crush shifted from dream guy to smiles.
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The next day was filled with paperwork, some more games, and summer plans. Counselors were packed in a staff room with three couches, four comfy chairs, and a carpet. Seat position meant everything. Of course I wanted to sit next to Mongoose at this point but it wasn’t always easy. Turns out he had grabbed the attention of other girls. But I wasn’t too anxious because there were plenty of new people to get to know.
Dinner that night turned into a game of sorts. Our boss challenged us to get out of our comfort zones and sit with someone new. He told us that the person we sat across from we needed to find out at least three things: favorite movie, favorite ice cream flavor, and something that no one else in the room knows about them. He included that question because many people had grown up with each other or knew each other pretty well. He told us to get up and find someone to sit by. I decided not to move, I hate situations like that where you are hoping for a particular person and you end up with the person no one else wants to be paired up with. So I opted out and let others choose for me.
A flash a blonde crossed my eyes. Mongoose was sitting across from me.
I smiled. He told me he had wanted to get to know me better after my performance the night before. We started chatting and I learned that his father had pushed him off a dock into open water when he was 6 years old to learn how to swim. Mongoose didn’t necessarily enjoy swimming because of this but had been a lifeguard the previous two summers. I told him my favorite movie was The Little Mermaid, because I couldn’t think of anything else. Then came him asking about what no one else knew about me. I scanned my thoughts and blurted out,
“I wasn’t kissed until I was sixteen. Which was this last winter when I had my first boyfriend.”
I immediately regretted what I had said. I mean it was a serious case of word vomit and I have no idea why I chose that bit of information. I guess I thought that he would be impressed with my lack of dating experience? Maybe I was going for the innocent flower approach? Well whatever reason his expression was priceless.
He smiled, realizing that I was extremely unaccustomed to the art of flirtation, and seemed to think it was adorable. I figured he was surprised, I mean most people I knew had received their first kiss at age twelve or thirteen. I was a late bloomer and was apparently proud of it. He liked it though. I could tell. Even so, I turned bright red and mumbled something to the effect of,
“Gosh, that was a silly thing to say. Let’s try for something not SO personal. Um…..I used to own a cow. Well, a bull technically. His name was Spritlee Boo. He was all white. Get it? Sprite and a ghost….”
Oh boy, it seems that at this point I was already a goner. Clueless to the intensity of my crush. I blame it on his smile. It makes a girl do silly things.
Click here for Part 3
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