Topic:
You are reading ‘Waiting for Godot’ by Samuel Beckett for drama class. In the play,
Vladimir and Estragon engage in a variety of discussions while awaiting a man called Godot,
who never arrives. Your homework is to write a diary entry about a situation when you
realise you have been waiting for someone or something that never arrives.
Dear Diary,
We were reading the drama ‘Waiting for Godot’ by Samuel Beckett at school today. In the play, two men named Vladimir and Estragon hold a lengthy conversation about various topics while waiting for another man, who also is the man in the title, Godot. In the end, Godot never shows up. After reading the play, we were asked by Ms Young, our drama teacher, to reflect on the play, and think if we could relate to any characters or scenes of the drama. It made me think of that time Mary stood me up.
You remember my friend Mary, right? I’ve talked about her a lot of times here. Well, I’m sure you know this already, but she got really busy doing something around the time this happened. ‘Cause of that, I didn’t try to ask her to hang out with me. She reached out to me one day and said that she missed me and wanted us to go out shopping during the weekend. Of course, I didn’t want her to waste time keeping me company, so I asked her if she was sure she could take a break from whatever she was doing and go shopping with me. She confirmed that she was okay with it. Mind you, until this point, I still didn’t know what she was busy with.
Anyways, Saturday rolls around and I told her to meet me in Mong Kok near exit D. She agrees. Running late myself, I forgot my earphones and rushed out the door. We agreed to meet up at 6 p.m. so that we could have dinner before strolling around. By the time I got to the place we agreed to meet up, it was already 6.05 p.m. Thinking I was going to have to apologize for being late, Mary is nowhere to be found. I immediately messaged her, thinking that I was the one who got our meet up time wrong, or that I went to the wrong place. She took 10 minutes to actually respond, saying that she was really sorry and would be at least 30 minutes late, as she had an urgent problem she had to deal with before she could go out. I texted her a simple okay, and just continued scrolling through my phone, waiting for her to arrive.
After another 20 minutes, I texted her again, finding it weird that she was supposed to arrive 10 minutes ago but I still couldn’t find her. She gave me the same answer, saying that she was still fixing the problem and would need another 30 minutes. I thought, “Well, I guess that’s fine. I’ll just walk around while waiting for her.” That message should have been the first indication that she wasn’t going to show up, but I remained positive and thought nothing of it.
After walking around a nearby mall for 45 minutes, I exited the mall and found that the sun had already set. I checked my phone and realized that there were no missed calls, nor were there any notifications. That’s when I realized that Mary wasn’t going to come, and that I wasted my time waiting for her. She had stood me up. I was really annoyed with the fact that she didn’t bother to tell me that she wasn’t going to be showing up, and had me waiting for her. I just sent her a simple text saying that I was going to be leaving and went home.
To be honest, I don’t know if I should have been mad or should have been hurt. Being friends with her for a long time, I really didn’t mind if she had other things to do. She should have just told me that she didn’t want to go shopping, or that she was too busy to show up. Later that night, I asked her what she was doing that made her so busy, and apparently she was preparing to publish a book. I mean, good for her, I guess, but it would have been much appreciated if she could have just told me and not have been so secretive about it. It would also have been much better if she had just told me that she had to stand me up instead of having me wait around for so long. She apologized, though. I forgave her for it, but it’s still something that’s hard to forget, so I thought of it during class today. I don’t know why I didn’t write about it on that day though.
So that’s the story of the time I realized that Mary wasn’t going to come. It’s getting late now, so I think I’m gonna wrap up my entry here. Good night diary!