16 Comments
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DRNaturegirl's avatar

Yes. Can relate! My ex-husband said we’d move to Scotland for 15 years. Our ‘dream’ to run b&b or cafe. Eventually I left him (not for that reason!) and did it on my own.

Jane Dougherty's avatar

Some men are full of great ideas, but always ‘one day’. Good for you for getting out! And on!

A.P. Murphy's avatar

Excellent super-shortie. Have you read-seen Revolutionary Road? A similar wistful regret but in the last act revved up to wild hysteria

Jane Dougherty's avatar

Thank you! No, I haven’t. Just looked it up and it sounds like quite a story! Can’t imagine how the do-it-yourself abortion would have gone down in 1960s America.

FranB's avatar

The novel is brilliant. I haven't seen the film and don't plan to.

Jane Dougherty's avatar

I’d never heard of it, but I can see why the film was never made in the 60s and had to wait until 2008.

FranB's avatar

The book is excellent, but not jolly!

A.P. Murphy's avatar

It's a grisly scene in the movie, though more for how the viewer imagines it than what's shown. I haven't read the novel but I found the movie rather overdone, I prefer my domestic dramas of disillusion more low-key.

Jane Dougherty's avatar

Me too. And I really don’t like Leonardo di Caprio. It sounds as though it went rather over the top at the end.

It always amuses me when I read (or see) stories where ordinary Americans, not super-rich or with fancy jobs, think they can go and live in Paris, just because they want to. I mean, we can’t just go and live in New York, can we? They’d have found out soon enough I expect.

A.P. Murphy's avatar

You sound like my wife - I always have to wheedle or cajole to get her to watch a di Caprio movie. And yet he’s supposed to be quite the heartthrob, I can’t see it somehow

Jane Dougherty's avatar

He’s a heartthrob if you fancy ferrets.

A.P. Murphy's avatar

Quite the hottie among the mustelidaephile community I hear

Ali Isaac's avatar

Haha, he is that!

Ali Isaac's avatar

What a sad story. I thought she would have upped and left him, gone to Italy by herself. Maybe Italy was just a dream to her, really, but it was easier to blame him for her unhappiness than her own lack of motivation. And he was a selfish dick, uncaring enough that he didnt recognise her unhappiness and address it.

Jane Dougherty's avatar

I’d have liked her to have done, but I think reality for most of us is, as you say, having a dream that we don’t really believe in. We make do. Even when what we’ve ended up with is an insensitive, self-absorbed prick.