A secret admirer is an individual who feels adoration, fondness or

love Love encompasses a range of strong and positive emotional and mental states, from the most sublime virtue or good habit, the deepest Interpersonal relationship, interpersonal affection, to the simplest pleasure. An example of this range of ...

for another person without disclosing their identity to that person, and who might send

gifts A gift or a present is an item given to someone without the expectation of payment or anything in return. An item is not a gift if that item is already owned by the one to whom it is given. Although gift-giving might involve an expectation ...

love letter A love letter is an expression of love in written form. However delivered, the letter may be anything from a short and simple message of love to a lengthy explanation and description of feelings. History One of the oldest references to a lo ...

s to their crush.

Grade school

The goal of a secret admirer is to woo the object of their affections, and then to reveal their identity, paving the way for a real relationship – a revealing which at school age usually occurs on

Valentine's Day Valentine's Day, also called Saint Valentine's Day or the Feast of Saint Valentine, is celebrated annually on February 14. It originated as a Christian feast day honoring one or two early Christian martyrs named Saint Valentine and, throu ...

, ''the day of love''. Reactions to a gushy Valentine may range from approval to

gross out Gross out is described as a movement in art (often with comical conotations), which is intended to shock the viewer(s) and disgust the wider audience by presenting them with controversial material (such as toilet humor and fetishes) that might be ...

. Many

elementary school A primary school (in Ireland, the United Kingdom, Australia, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica, and South Africa), junior school (in Australia), elementary school or grade school (in North America and the Philippines) is a school for primary ed ...

s and sometimes schools up to

secondary schools A secondary school describes an institution that provides secondary education and also usually includes the building where this takes place. Some secondary schools provide both '' lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper seconda ...

have children do

projects on February 14 to craft and send "secret admirer" letters to classmates, which may not actually reflect a real "crush" and may be done neutrally or arbitrarily, and, perhaps, if done under duress from the class project requirement, reluctantly.

Office

Notes from a secret admirer may feature in office dating, but are not recommended as a means of approaching a colleague, and may border on

sexual harassment Sexual harassment is a type of harassment involving the use of explicit or implicit sexual overtones, including the unwelcome and inappropriate promises of rewards in exchange for sexual favors. Sexual harassment includes a range of actions fro ...

. Youthful passion for a celebrity stands on the boundary between secret admirer and fan; while the secret or concealed admiration of 'having eyes for' may also feature as a preliminary phase in the process of initially approaching the opposite sex.

Cultural examples

The adolescent

Mendelssohn Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy (3 February 18094 November 1847), born and widely known as Felix Mendelssohn, was a German composer, pianist, organist and conductor of the early Romantic music, Romantic period. Mendelssohn's compositi ...

wrote a song - ''Frage (Question)'' – about his own suspected secret admirer.R. Larry Todd, ''Mendelssohn'' (2003) p. 176

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Secret Admirer Love Interpersonal relationships

Grade school

Office

Cultural examples

See also

References