In honor of St. Patricks Days being exactly ONE WEEK before my BIRTHDAY, a repost thats old enough to be new to all of you. Enjoy some green today, Dear Reader.
Ill never forget the movie Pretty in Pink. I saw it multiple times as a giggly fifteen year old girl. I knew Molly Ringwalds pink prom dress was to die for; Jon Cryers pompadour was not as nerdy as we were led to believe; and Andrew McCarthy was a dreamy-eyed boyfriend to be desired by all teenage girls everywhere. Drooling over movie stars was quintessentially teenage.
Fast forward to a March Saturday, 2010. All my teenage dream boats were distant, distant, distant memories, long buried somewhere in my subconscious. I was a happily married, almost forty-one year old woman just a few days shy of her next birthday, and my gift was spending that birthday in New York.
I wandered into the fish shop in Chelsea Market looking for MTM, but my lustful wandering eyes were sucked into the back end of another man, a vision in black ordering sushi. He was all alone. Dreamy-eyes turned around to face me. It was Andrew McCarthy, one of my many teenage heartthrob crushes.
I started giggling uncontrollably. My palms streamed with sweat, and my demeanor became hyperactive and exaggerated. You know, like a teenage girl.
No, I didnt bother him. Who knows what my disembodied mouth wouldve blurted out to humiliate me FOREVER??? I let him order his sushi in peace, if peace was staring at him with a stupid, starry-eyed look on my face while he waited in line for the cashier, and stalking him from behind a glass window outside the store, where I fled because I didnt want to look like a blithering idiot. MTM suffered all of this nonsense with an understanding that affirmed once again I married the right person.
Andrew was older but the same, rough around the edges but unmistakably him, and he gave me an amazing birthday gift. He made me feel like a teenager again, if only for a few minutes.
Guys, I have to admit that I don't think I have the nerve to try meeting Mr. McCarthy again...even though I have this nagging desire to want to get his travel memoir signed for all of us. I nearly passed out the first two times, so the 3rd time's the charm! I will probably faint just before I hit the front of the line.
