I’m sure we have all heard someone say or have at least said ourselves, “I have to live vicariously through you, because I can’t do that.” Most of the time, when one thinks of living vicariously through someone else, they think of doing something dangerous that they themselves could never do: riding a motorcycle, going skydiving or bungee jumping.

What I’m about to present to you isn’t quite the same, though it could be dangerous (if you’re into that sort of thing).

My idea for this week’s article was something completely different than what you are now reading, but after having a conversation with a good friend of mine, I couldn’t let this opportunity pass me by.  Rather than try to explain this to you, I’m going to recap the event.

Last week, as I was sitting with a group of friends, an interesting discussion came up.  It turned out that for two of the guys, it was their first time living on a coed floor.  While one of the guys has a girlfriend, the other doesn’t.  We will call the guy who has a girlfriend Justin, and we will call the guy without the girlfriend Mike.

It didn’t surprise me when Justin said he wanted to guide Mike, so Mike could hook up with the girls on the floor.  Friends always want to help out friends, especially when those friends are your “boys.”

What really caught my attention was Justin’s reasoning for helping to hook Mike up:  “I have to live vicariously through him, ‘cause I obviously can’t hook up with them,” Justin said.

Are we all just living vicariously through our friends?  Do we all just want a piece of what we can’t have?

Clearly, in this situation, we can understand why Justin has to live through Mike.  He’s in a relationship and isn’t going to cheat on his girlfriend just to have the college experience of committing floorcest (which, if you read my first column, you already know that I completely advise to steer clear of).  However, if he can’t experience it, there’s no reason why he can’t see it play out for someone else.

But do singles also live vicariously through those friends that are in committed relationships? Or is it just the other way around?  And is there a difference between men living vicariously through other men and women living vicariously through other women?

There have been times in my life where I have said “I am living vicariously through you” to my friends in relationships.  When my best friend’s boyfriend takes her out on a romantic date or to a Broadway show in the city, I tend to want every detail so I can picture it and be a part of it.  I live through her because I am single and don’t have that romance in my life.

Cody Harwood-Smith, a 5th-semester journalism and English double major, said that as a single college student, he absolutely wants to be in a relationship.

“I feel like when you’re single, everybody else around you is in a relationship and it sucks.  Even if that’s not how it actually is, it always feels that way. It’s as if everybody else is in a club that you’re not in,” he said.

Clearly, then, there isn’t that much difference between singles and those in relationships, or between women and men.

Sometimes when you are single, you miss aspects of being in a real relationship, just like when you are in a relationship, there are times when you miss aspects of being single.  As human beings, it is inevitable that we will want things that we can’t have.  It’s a fact of life.  And as long as you know the difference between reality and imagination, there is nothing wrong with living vicariously through others.