travel envy

The first time I realized what it is to be jealous, I was in sixth grade. Every day at break (every. single. day), my best friend at the time, Christie, would pull out a Tupperware container filled with salty popcorn. We would go outside and she would eat her popcorn and I would wander around, looking at it and her sideways, wishing I had some and wondering why my parents didn't pack me some popcorn for break. Sometimes she'd feel sorry for me and give me a handful. That was worse, because who wants pity popcorn? But I took it anyway. And I got over it. In, oh, my second year in college.

But today I'm not to proud to admit that I have again found myself sidled with some jaw-crunching jealousy. But, instead of popcorn, I have travel envy. Big time travel envy, like pack-a-bag-right-now travel envy. We have friends/colleagues now in Rome and Milan and Tuscany and South Korea and others just back from Prague. Dang. It didn't help that over Labor Day, we ended up talking about Rome over burgers and awesome bean salad at some friends' house. We sipped proscecco and discussed how to appropriately curse football referees in Italian and how not to fall and crack your head open on wet street pavers in Rome. It made me ACHE to be there, not that I want to particularly escape anything here. In fact, things are going really well. But I'm craving the trip planning, the looking forward to being tired and grumpy after flying someplace, the chance to take walks on new-to-us sidewalks, the belly filled with strange food, the people in a new place, the sound of a new language. I'd love to be in Rome right now. I love that city, with its graffiti and confusing intersections and crosswalks that challenge your inner dare devil. We have a couple of free tickets in our pockets, and it's killing me! I want to go everywhere, but where now? New York? Boston? Huntington Beach? The Great State of North Dakota followed by the Other Great State of South Dakota? Anybody? Anybody?