Even as a kid, I never subscribed to the Beaver Cleaver theory that girls are yucky. Pretty much from Day 1 of the first grade, I would scan my female classmates, settle on the perfect one for me, and instantly develop a crush.Girls, I thought, are not yucky at all. They’re nifty.
And so through elementary school I had a succession of love affairs, many (O.K., most) of them entirely unrequited. As a result, some girls who have long since disappeared from my life - who, let’s face it, never were much in it - nevertheless occupy a fond place in my memory.
But there was one who really held my heart, one with staying power, one whom I watched grow from a feisty little kindergartner into a slinky young teenager: Angela Cartwright.
From “Make Room for Daddy” through “Lost in Space” she captured my imagination, the embodiment of the girl next door who just happened to be a TV actress. Not a particularly good actress, truth be told, but I’m a forgiving sort when dazzled by looks.
Alas, like the others, she eventually fell out of my life. The last I remember of her was a peanut butter commercial - or was it toothpaste? - and then I lost track.
Until I Googled her.
And learned that Angela has her own Web site (of course), with filmography and interviews and scrapbook photos of her career and various calendars, T-shirts, coffee mugs, postcards and the like featuring her own artwork (who knew?). She’ll even autograph pictures, like the one above, as Penny in “Lost in Space,” for $20.
Does she look like that anymore? No. She’s 56. Does she still look good? I think so.
Some crushes have staying power.
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Your adolescent crush with Angela actually seems realistic compared with mine. I chose Sophia Loren, Leslie Ughams (sp?) and, closer to home, Carolyn Bondi, the "bad girl" friend of my older sister (eight years older -- she was 18), who had long, dark hair "frosted" with blonde, which contrasted nicely with her summer tan, wore pale pink lipstick and mascara, and drove a yellow Mercury Monterrey convertible with a yellow plastic rose fastened to the aerial. I never really got over her. Later it was also discovered that she possessed a naked picture of her boyfriend, which was absolutely unheard-of in those days.
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