depressing realization

[fictional]

it was two, maybe three world cups ago. west germany ended up winning that one, i think. my father and i taped every single match, spending hours pouring over the results in the newspaper, doing complicated mathematical analysis of who would advance from round to round. i remember sitting there, in our living room, watching the sun pour through the windows and dance on dust motes in front of the television, and turning to my father and saying, "you know, when we watch the 2002 world cup together (as we most definitely will), i'll be all graduated from college. isn't that a strange thought?"

and now i'm sitting here in italy, six thousand miles away from home, as people cluster around televisions in the piazza farnese and campo dei fiori, vociferously announcing each goal and corner kick to the entire nation with screams and yells. things haven't gone as planned, i haven't done what i meant to do. graduating from college seems as far away as it did on that sunny day long ago.

this isn't where i was supposed to be.