Mancrushing

Annette Corns. She was my first.

I'm not talking about anything sordid here. Think back to when you were a small child, when you used to look at the big kids with real adoration, sometimes even follow one particular favourite around, much to their annoyance. They seemed like the coolest person you've ever laid your eyes on, you wanted to dress like them, act like them, hell you wanted to BE them.

It's funny how as we grow older and we learn about the adult world we find out that's it not appropriate to act like that anymore and how it's 'a bit weird' to have those kind of feelings about someone. So, during our teenage years, when we've already got enough going on with our bodies changing & all those crazy hormones surging through our veins, we start to learn what is & isn't socially acceptable from those people around us. But secretly most of us still find a few people super cool, just like we did before, and they may even become our friends, or even our girlfriend or boyfriend, and we can't quite believe how lucky we are.

What I like about children feeling this way about others is this adoration happens before they have any of the adolescent stirrings of sexuality, so it's pure unadulterated love. I think that's pretty cool. And I have news for you - I still have them. They're not quite the same as they were when I was a child - I don't want to copy them or be like them anymore, and I have different boxes I need ticking now, I like to be able to talk to them about art, style, spirituality, philosophy, or even just banter, but I definitely still have them. When I meet someone new & I feel a real connection to them it takes me a while to work out whether I fancy them, or whether it's just this platonic kind of love.

I was discussing this idea with a (straight) male friend last night & I said to him "surely you've had a mancrush, right?" A mancrush - when a straight male loves another guy so much it almost feels like you fancy them, but you don't want to do any of the sexy stuff. So I've adopted it as a new phrase, to refer to this platonic adoration, and I kind of like it. And I LOVE the fact that it can refer to men OR women even though it contains a gender specific reference. I have a few mancrushes at the moment, and these people inspire me to be creative every time I interact with them, pretty much, which can be very intense! I definitely prefer the phrase mancrush to muse too.

One of the main missions of my writing is to talk about the things that people don't really talk about but they should. This topic reminds me of one of De La Vega's awesome statements: "We have so much to unlearn here". I'm determined to get the phrase mancrush out there, we ALL have them. :-D