Perhaps that's explained by a further paragraph that I didn't excerpt, in the interest of semi-brevity:
You can mistake a situational crush for the real thing because the emotions are so intense. Especially if you're in a vulnerable spot. You can mistake the sweep of 13 year old flirty-flirt for "soulmate comin' towards ya". This is the huge danger with the situational crush. You can get CRUSHED by the situational crush which defeats the whole purpose.
Situational crushes, basically, are not for amateurs.
I liked being a stagehand, because it was more fun to me. Even now when I go to the theater I am just as excited to watch scene changes as the actual play itself.
Our school plays were full of situational crushes, if only because I went to an all-girls school and we were allowed to import Real! Live! Boys! to play the male roles.
I enjoyed being a stagehand in 8th grade but I have no idea how I ended up there. I remember being surprised to hear that someone had suggested my name.
The play/situational crush is interesting. There were some people I was in shows with whom I exclusively loved because my characters loved them. Like, I remember one guy who played a love interest who, in any other circumstance, I was not fond of. But because he was so sweet and tender as his character loving my character, I damn near swooned whenever he came on stage. IRL, it translated to a deep respect and mutual kindness, though never a real intimate friendship. We had almost nothing in common. He just kissed me so sweetly I felt damn near grateful.
I wonder if situational crushing isn't part of a fantasy to be the kind of person who would date that person. Like, many of those who fantasize about the coffee bartender without taking him as a serious crush might be the kind who would never IRL date a coffee bartender. For me, at the time I had the situational crush on my actor friend, I was dating lots of guys who were very sexy but not nice and he was a kind of fantasy about "wow, I could pretend to be the kind of girl who dates nice, kind men who treat me gently." Or the "work husband" -- I have had many of those, and they're always the opposite of the kind of guys I'm actually into at the time.
20: Fucking slol. He recently referenced Grosse Pointe Blank, and I felt compelled to watch it this weekend. There's a stoner character in it who approvingly greets the Minnie Driver (named "Debbie Newberry") with some line including "very Newberry." It was floating around in my head, and it floated out. Deb's the GND, so it's a compliment. (Slol is similarly responsible for my rash of references to Barksdale.)
Becks' link in 13, about "work husbands," was very interesting, sharp and well-written, particularly about the difficulting one has communicating about what really goes on at work. At the same time, I have to say that there was something unpleasant about, something in the narrative or the sensibility that repelled me.
Maybe consciously "guy" writing is like that, or maybe it's that the piece expresses the views of a subculture. Anybody else feel the same way?
I believe that a lot of actor marriage breakups begin as "situational crushes".
A good friend's marriage ended that way. He was an actor, and got busted screwing a situational crush; she was a teacher, and left him for her work husband.
28: 'guy' writing tends to reduce women to props whose worth is based on their attractiveness/pliancy? That's what I usually find irritating about it, anyway.
1. I can just imagine that there are people who prefer Mick's version of Just My Imagination to Smokeys. It's one of the things that makes me pessimistic about mankind.
2. I reject the concept of the work-wife/husband. This term represents a failure of imagination, as if the only boxes for a relationship between genders are pre-marriage, marriage, and post-marriage. We already have a word for the relationship with the content described in the article: friend. The relationships in the article weren't really gender-based: should I call a male friend in my office my 'gay work husband'? (NTTAWWI)
speaking as a quondam risk manager, if there is a possibility that a "no risk" event might turn into a risk, then there's a risk that there's a risk, which by a fairly simple commutative law means that there's a risk.
31.2: Aren't you pretending that a social dynamic doesn't exist just because you disapprove of it? It seems simply true that it's difficult for men and women to have intimate (emotional support, informing the other person about spinach in their teeth, whatever) friendships without it at least looking to outsiders like a romantic relationship. I don't think that it's a good thing that it should be that way, but calling that sort of tight relationship a 'work spouse' relationship does recognize something real about how it looks to outsiders and feels to the people in it.
To me, "work spouse" seems apt because my work husband holds an analogous position to mine on another team and we share staff. So there's a lot of coordinating of activities to make sure we present a common message to the people who work for us, otherwise "if dad says no to the kids, they'll go and try to ask mom if it's OK".
Calling that sort of friendship a "work spouse" would seem to have one upside: it might get the people involved to think a bit more seriously about the nature of their friendship/crush.
"Work Spouse" is a preferable term to something like "Work Boyfriend/Girlfriend", as the latter clearly implies that the two are making whoopee, not just providing emotional support and inspecting each others' teeth.
It seems simply true that it's difficult for men and women to have intimate (emotional support, informing the other person about spinach in their teeth, whatever) friendships without it at least looking to outsiders like a romantic relationship.
I don't disapprove of the relationship at all, but I do disapprove of 'outsiders' apparent unwillingness to accept a relationship between a man and a woman, a professional relationship that includes friendship, as normal and not-raised-eyebrow-worthy. I've yet to see any reason to think that these work marriages work any different when they're same-gendered.
Jack, I'm not seeing how more thought is an upside.
I guess I'm remembering all the infidelity threads, CC. I'm positing a marriage in which one person builds an entire life in the workplace, which the other person can barely imagine; I could see that kind of marriage foundering very suddenly.
I can see how the nature of male-female dynamics in our society could make it easier to develop the kind of cross-gender relationship that's sufficiently intimate to be analogized to marriage; I don't think two guys, at least, would be as comfortable with the same level of intimacy. (It may be different for women.) But then, I've mentioned my higher level of comfort with women before.
I also agree with IDP that there was something irritating about that article, but I can't quite put my finger on it. It wasn't so much objectification of women, since all the women were presented very much as people, but there was just something about the tone of the thing that shouted "macho asshole." I'm not sure what.
I don't think two guys, at least, would be as comfortable with the same level of intimacy.
Maybe this is it. My experience is completely to the contrary: over the years I've had friendships with male colleagues that are every bit as intimate as the 'work marriages' I've had (and some of those have been quite close).
Jack, if anyone in my office has constructed an elaborate fantasy life around their relationship with me, I'd just as soon not know about it. (OK, now that I think about it, this actually did happen to me many years ago. Near the end of an end-of-season party at a seasonal operation, a woman came up from behind, threw her arms around me, and declared herself. Sure that she must be drunk* -- I recognized but didn't really know her, and couldn't imagine that she thought she knew enough of me to mean what she'd said -- I asked if she wasn't mistaken about who I was [what with coming up behind me and all]. She sort of slunk away, and I couldn't tell whether it was because she had actually meant me, or it was a mistake.)
My experience is completely to the contrary: over the years I've had friendships with male colleagues that are every bit as intimate as the 'work marriages' I've had (and some of those have been quite close).
I'd say this is right -- that sort of intimate friendship happens all the time with same-sex friends. And I don't mean to disapprove of tight friendships that cross gender lines (or, I suppose, if you're gay, that don't cross gender lines) -- no reason to cut half the human race out from the potential for close friendship. But that sort of close friendship has a lot in common with romantic relationships (and, under circumstances where both people are unattached, is the sort of thing that tends to turn into a romantic relationship).
Again: without the risk. Did I mention that part? Without the risk. That's my favorite part.
I believe that a lot of actor marriage breakups begin as "situational crushes".
I am missing something.
Posted by Michael | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 5:46 PM
Perhaps that's explained by a further paragraph that I didn't excerpt, in the interest of semi-brevity:
Posted by Becks | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 5:49 PM
Is it possible (even commonplace) to have a situational crush on a fictional character? 'Cause I have a situational crush on Avon Barksdale.
Posted by SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 5:55 PM
Situational crushes can be dangerous for people whose ethics are situational at best.
Posted by eb | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 6:13 PM
I miss doing theatre.
Posted by slolernr | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 6:18 PM
Me, too. I loved that post.
Posted by winna | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 6:26 PM
Me three. Not that I was any good at the acting part.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 6:37 PM
I liked being a stagehand, because it was more fun to me. Even now when I go to the theater I am just as excited to watch scene changes as the actual play itself.
Posted by winna | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 6:44 PM
Wow, Sheila O'Malley. I'm so glad to see this, because I forgot to bookmark her after I ran across her lovely piece on Jean Kerr.
(Who, to keep on the theatre theme, was a playwright married to NYT drama critic Walter Kerr.)
Posted by Witt | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 7:23 PM
Our school plays were full of situational crushes, if only because I went to an all-girls school and we were allowed to import Real! Live! Boys! to play the male roles.
Posted by Becks | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 7:46 PM
I enjoyed being a stagehand in 8th grade but I have no idea how I ended up there. I remember being surprised to hear that someone had suggested my name.
Posted by eb | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 8:06 PM
The play/situational crush is interesting. There were some people I was in shows with whom I exclusively loved because my characters loved them. Like, I remember one guy who played a love interest who, in any other circumstance, I was not fond of. But because he was so sweet and tender as his character loving my character, I damn near swooned whenever he came on stage. IRL, it translated to a deep respect and mutual kindness, though never a real intimate friendship. We had almost nothing in common. He just kissed me so sweetly I felt damn near grateful.
Posted by A White Bear | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 8:53 PM
I would argue that the "work husband" phenomenon is a subtype of "situational crush".
Posted by Becks | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 8:58 PM
So tell us about your work husband, Becks.
Posted by SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 9:01 PM
I wonder if situational crushing isn't part of a fantasy to be the kind of person who would date that person. Like, many of those who fantasize about the coffee bartender without taking him as a serious crush might be the kind who would never IRL date a coffee bartender. For me, at the time I had the situational crush on my actor friend, I was dating lots of guys who were very sexy but not nice and he was a kind of fantasy about "wow, I could pretend to be the kind of girl who dates nice, kind men who treat me gently." Or the "work husband" -- I have had many of those, and they're always the opposite of the kind of guys I'm actually into at the time.
Posted by A White Bear | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 9:03 PM
14 - Given the type of people I get along with, it should be obvious that my work husband is The Instigator.
Posted by Becks | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 9:05 PM
I'm surprised blogcrushes haven't been brought up yet.
Posted by eb | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 9:19 PM
"coffee bartender"?
Posted by NL | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 9:22 PM
16: Not very Newberry, Becks.
Posted by SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 9:24 PM
19 - ???
Posted by Becks | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 9:25 PM
Maybe he's saying those stories will never win the Newberry medal.
Posted by eb | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 9:28 PM
20: Fucking slol. He recently referenced Grosse Pointe Blank, and I felt compelled to watch it this weekend. There's a stoner character in it who approvingly greets the Minnie Driver (named "Debbie Newberry") with some line including "very Newberry." It was floating around in my head, and it floated out. Deb's the GND, so it's a compliment. (Slol is similarly responsible for my rash of references to Barksdale.)
Posted by SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 9:46 PM
18 gets it exactly right.
(Also: AWB! Long time no see! How was Kansas?)
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 9:47 PM
Slol is similarly responsible for my rash of references to Barksdale.
I'm pretty sure I never mentioned Barksdale in a romantic context.
Posted by slolernr | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 11:11 PM
Situational crushes aren't romantic, right?
Posted by eb | Link to this comment | 08-13-06 11:48 PM
Are they or aren't they? I'm a little confused by this thread.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 12:02 AM
I think the answer is yes and no.
Posted by eb | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 12:22 AM
Becks' link in 13, about "work husbands," was very interesting, sharp and well-written, particularly about the difficulting one has communicating about what really goes on at work. At the same time, I have to say that there was something unpleasant about, something in the narrative or the sensibility that repelled me.
Maybe consciously "guy" writing is like that, or maybe it's that the piece expresses the views of a subculture. Anybody else feel the same way?
Posted by I don't pay | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 8:21 AM
I believe that a lot of actor marriage breakups begin as "situational crushes".
A good friend's marriage ended that way. He was an actor, and got busted screwing a situational crush; she was a teacher, and left him for her work husband.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 8:24 AM
28: 'guy' writing tends to reduce women to props whose worth is based on their attractiveness/pliancy? That's what I usually find irritating about it, anyway.
Posted by winna | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 8:48 AM
1. I can just imagine that there are people who prefer Mick's version of Just My Imagination to Smokeys. It's one of the things that makes me pessimistic about mankind.
2. I reject the concept of the work-wife/husband. This term represents a failure of imagination, as if the only boxes for a relationship between genders are pre-marriage, marriage, and post-marriage. We already have a word for the relationship with the content described in the article: friend. The relationships in the article weren't really gender-based: should I call a male friend in my office my 'gay work husband'? (NTTAWWI)
Posted by CharleyCarp | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 9:53 AM
speaking as a quondam risk manager, if there is a possibility that a "no risk" event might turn into a risk, then there's a risk that there's a risk, which by a fairly simple commutative law means that there's a risk.
Posted by dsquared | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 9:58 AM
Davies, don't bring your logic up in here.
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 10:00 AM
Crushes are stupid and pointless and made of worms.
Posted by strasmangelo jones | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 10:20 AM
Whoa, I totally have a work wife.
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 10:21 AM
isn't life just a series of situations? these seem like normal crushes to me.
Posted by yoyo | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 10:21 AM
31.2: Aren't you pretending that a social dynamic doesn't exist just because you disapprove of it? It seems simply true that it's difficult for men and women to have intimate (emotional support, informing the other person about spinach in their teeth, whatever) friendships without it at least looking to outsiders like a romantic relationship. I don't think that it's a good thing that it should be that way, but calling that sort of tight relationship a 'work spouse' relationship does recognize something real about how it looks to outsiders and feels to the people in it.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 10:29 AM
To me, "work spouse" seems apt because my work husband holds an analogous position to mine on another team and we share staff. So there's a lot of coordinating of activities to make sure we present a common message to the people who work for us, otherwise "if dad says no to the kids, they'll go and try to ask mom if it's OK".
Posted by Becks | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 10:41 AM
Calling that sort of friendship a "work spouse" would seem to have one upside: it might get the people involved to think a bit more seriously about the nature of their friendship/crush.
Posted by Jackmormon | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 10:42 AM
My work wife is actually above me in the hierarchy.
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 10:44 AM
"Work Spouse" is a preferable term to something like "Work Boyfriend/Girlfriend", as the latter clearly implies that the two are making whoopee, not just providing emotional support and inspecting each others' teeth.
Posted by M/tch M/lls | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 10:47 AM
It seems simply true that it's difficult for men and women to have intimate (emotional support, informing the other person about spinach in their teeth, whatever) friendships without it at least looking to outsiders like a romantic relationship.
I don't disapprove of the relationship at all, but I do disapprove of 'outsiders' apparent unwillingness to accept a relationship between a man and a woman, a professional relationship that includes friendship, as normal and not-raised-eyebrow-worthy. I've yet to see any reason to think that these work marriages work any different when they're same-gendered.
Jack, I'm not seeing how more thought is an upside.
Posted by CharleyCarp | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 10:53 AM
Also, doesn't "work spouse" include a nice sense that your real spouse should be your best friend?
Posted by SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 10:55 AM
I guess I'm remembering all the infidelity threads, CC. I'm positing a marriage in which one person builds an entire life in the workplace, which the other person can barely imagine; I could see that kind of marriage foundering very suddenly.
Posted by Jackmormon | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 11:07 AM
I can see how the nature of male-female dynamics in our society could make it easier to develop the kind of cross-gender relationship that's sufficiently intimate to be analogized to marriage; I don't think two guys, at least, would be as comfortable with the same level of intimacy. (It may be different for women.) But then, I've mentioned my higher level of comfort with women before.
I also agree with IDP that there was something irritating about that article, but I can't quite put my finger on it. It wasn't so much objectification of women, since all the women were presented very much as people, but there was just something about the tone of the thing that shouted "macho asshole." I'm not sure what.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 11:27 AM
I don't think two guys, at least, would be as comfortable with the same level of intimacy.
Maybe this is it. My experience is completely to the contrary: over the years I've had friendships with male colleagues that are every bit as intimate as the 'work marriages' I've had (and some of those have been quite close).
Jack, if anyone in my office has constructed an elaborate fantasy life around their relationship with me, I'd just as soon not know about it. (OK, now that I think about it, this actually did happen to me many years ago. Near the end of an end-of-season party at a seasonal operation, a woman came up from behind, threw her arms around me, and declared herself. Sure that she must be drunk* -- I recognized but didn't really know her, and couldn't imagine that she thought she knew enough of me to mean what she'd said -- I asked if she wasn't mistaken about who I was [what with coming up behind me and all]. She sort of slunk away, and I couldn't tell whether it was because she had actually meant me, or it was a mistake.)
* I know I was.
Posted by CharleyCarp | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 11:51 AM
My experience is completely to the contrary: over the years I've had friendships with male colleagues that are every bit as intimate as the 'work marriages' I've had (and some of those have been quite close).
I'd say this is right -- that sort of intimate friendship happens all the time with same-sex friends. And I don't mean to disapprove of tight friendships that cross gender lines (or, I suppose, if you're gay, that don't cross gender lines) -- no reason to cut half the human race out from the potential for close friendship. But that sort of close friendship has a lot in common with romantic relationships (and, under circumstances where both people are unattached, is the sort of thing that tends to turn into a romantic relationship).
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 11:59 AM
But I'm not sure what I'm arguing here, if anything.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 08-14-06 11:59 AM