The People's Choice

Patricia Breslin, I loved you. Sure, it was puppy love, but what do you expect? I was only 2 to 5 years old during the original broadcast of "People's Choice," but I was precocious. And besides, I mainly watched you in re-runs from the NYC television stations in the early 1950s, so I was probably at least 6.

And then there was your co-staring role in "Crooked Road," on Alfred Hitchcock Presents, a show I will never forget, along with Walther Mathau as the crooked deputy. By the time you appeared on The Twilight Zone, season 4, "No Time Like the Past," I was truly ready to appreciate your maternal charms. You were the mother I always wished I had had.

Now, when I happen upon a vision of you on a wonderful old television time capsule, it as though I were in love with you all over for the first time. I wonder how many thousands, nay millions, of once young American males feel the same way about you?

You, Patricia Breslin, are my ideal, the virginal girl of my pre- pubescent fantasies, a woman I shall always seek, and never find, except in my dreams.

Unless, of course, I find a way to travel back in time. Somewhere. In time. Must go back. Focus! Concentrate! Ohio. Or is it Willoughby? Whatever.