The View From My Room

“Since I have the day off tomorrow, I think I’ll go to Florence.” As the words left his lips, I had to bite my tongue to keep from laughing and crying all at the same time. I get excited when I have time to go to Target. But Florence? Italy!?!? J. is one of my dearest friends on the earth. He just lives a very different reality from my own. He is going to cruise the world. Literally, around the world. And get paid to do it. Granted, this is a result of YEARS of training and a natural God-given talent that allows him to “sing for his supper,” a job only a handful of people in the world can do. And he’s good at it. However, of all the terrible places to rehearse, Italy is not quite up there with Orem Jr. High and the basement at the SCERA. This is why I have pent-up bitterness. Good-natured, kind, loving, ( and not true crazy-hateful) BITTERNESS. I wish I could sing. I really do. That is one of the things I have always wanted in my life. I wish I could earn my place in a job which, while extremely difficult and biased and unsteady, allowed me to spend 8 months on a luxury cruise ship. I don’t for a moment pretend that it isn’t hard, that being alone far from friends and family and Taco Bell isn’t going to be extremely difficult. And that he won’t work HARD, that he isn’t already. But I’d be willing to give it a go. It would be worth it on the first day off when I got to run off to, well, Florence. And he hasn’t even seen A Room With A View! I told him I may have to rethink our friendship—how could he go to Florence (not even for the first time, I might add) without understanding George and Lucy? Without knowing why I want postcards from Santa Croce? And why I would throw them into the Arno? So instead, I will plan my time so that I can go buy the DVD of A Room With A View for him, live vicariously through his fantastic adventures, and dream of the day I get to do the same.