From Jesus to Micky Dolenz

I listened to the Monkees tapes on my Walkman until I had to buy replacement copies. The Micky songs were my favorite, of course, and for good reason: he was the only one who could honestly sing well and, my nine-year-old self thought, with incredible soul.

The Monkees in the 80s
Photo © 16 Magazine

Then, one evening I caught a marathon of The Monkees episodes that was hosted by three of The Monkees (sans Mike Nesmith) and I saw exactly what Micky Dolenz looked like in 1986. He was older than my dad! He wore a Sonny Crockett knock-off white suit and had his hair slicked back, which only served to emphasize his receding hairline. Also, he wouldn’t stop interrupting the other two Monkees and kept mugging horribly to the camera. In other words, he was obnoxious and goofy. But most importantly, he was old!

That night I had a prophetic dream that I opened my closet and found (old) Micky, in his Sonny Crockett suit. He held out his arms for a hug and when I shrunk back, he spun around and around, before suddenly turning into Mike Seaver (Kirk Cameron) from Growing Pains. I was horrified and my crush was officially over—for about a decade.

Now, let’s go forward to my sophomore year at Ohio State University; the beginning of the spring quarter and my first day of History class. When my teacher walked through the door, my stomach flopped. He looked exactly like a young Micky Dolenz! Straight away, I was taken back to my crush in the winter of 1986. So, when my teacher turned out to be a damn good instructor, I fell hopelessly back in “love.” Only this time, I possessed the ability to talk to real-live boys. Soon after, I made it my mission to seduce this Micky look-alike. I’ll spare you the mortifying details. Let’s just say it was unsuccessful. . .

As a result, I decided to just enjoy the class and get as much out of it as possible. Because of that resolution, an exorcism of sorts happened. The ghost of my Micky Dolenz crush disappeared once and for all. I got an “A” in the course and a promise from the instructor to look into changing my major to History education. A plan to swiftly change my focus to a life spent studying the significance of important figures from the past while simultaneously kicking a crush on a pop culture icon from the past? It sounded like the perfect idea to me.

Read about more Weird Crushes. . .

Popshifter‘s Secret Garden of Crushes

The Key Word is “Goofy,” by Less Lee Moore

Andrea, Lynda, Margot, and Erin, by Christian Lipski

Crush Encounters of the Pre-Pubescent Kind, by Ann Clarke

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