"See how she leans her cheek upon her hand.
O that I were a glove upon that hand,
That I might touch that cheek."
— Romeo, Romeo and Juliet
It never fails; show a sexy woman touching a particular object (especially if she's hugging it, sitting on it, or has it in her mouth), and somebody will say "Boy, I wish I were a [object]." Sometimes may lead to the envious person having enmity/rivalry with said object.
See also Cargo Ship, when the audience imagines a Crack Pairing along similar lines.
Examples:
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Advertising
- Sony has used this in ads for the Playstation Portable.
- From the iconic jingle from Oscar Meyer:
I wish I was an Oscar Meyer wiener.
That is what I truly wish to be.
Because if I was an Oscar Meyer wiener,
Everyone would be in love with me.
Anime and Manga
- In one episode of Pokémon the Series: Diamond and Pearl, one part involves Brock saying about Cynthia, "I wish I were in her arms instead of that ice cream!". Right after she takes a lick of it.
- Several times throughout To Love Ru, boys would comment that they wished they were article of clothing on Lala's body. At one point, Yuuki Rito (through a bizarre set of circumstances) becomes Lala's personal robot Peke. One of Peke's main jobs is to materialize clothes for Lala which he (and in this case, Rito) must control, so in essence he actually accomplished the trope. Yuuki himself had never expressed such a wish, and he found it very awkward and embarrassing.
- Mysterious Girlfriend X chapter 61 has Tsubaki become envious of a shirt he left with Urabe, as she decided to use it as pajamas.
- Yo-kai Watch: When watching a show of idol group Next Harmeowny on the "after hours channel" with his male friends, during a scene where the girls are taking a bubble bath together, Eddie comments on how he wishes he were one of those bubbles.
- In chapter 56 of Kaguya-sama: Love Is War, the protagonists have a moon-viewing
party. Kaguya gets irritated when her Love Interest pays more attention to stargazing than to her.
Fan Works
- Harry Potter and the Nightmares of Futures Past: Harry sees Ginny stroking Crookshanks the cat on her lap, and has to suppress a stab of jealousy toward the cat. (But since Ginny is quite willing to sit on his lap, both before and after this, his jealousy doesn't escalate at all.)
- In Chapter 10 of I've Got Your Back, Pearl briefly stews with envy when she sees Marina kiss a sea bunny on the head while window-shopping at the pet store in Arowana Mall.
- In the Miraculous Ladybug fic Of Soulmates, Adrien is unimpressed by the stuffed cat toy his girlfriend cuddles with every night.
Film
- Wishmaster 4: The Prophecy Fulfilled: A variant when a bartender says within earshot of the disguised Jackass Genie, in reference to a hot stripper working in the place, "I'd sell my soul to be a pimple on her ass". The Djinn is more than happy to grant his wish.
- A review of A Life Less Ordinary included a picture of Cameron Diaz Bound and Gagged with the caption "Oh! To be that duct tape! Oh! To be that rope!"
- The Pauly Shore comedy Bio-Dome shows him and a buddy going to a job interview. When asked what their ambitions in life are, one of the boys says: "To die and come back as a leotard," and the other one nods and starts breathing heavily.
- In Friday the 13th (2009) reboot, Chewey wishes he could "die and come back as one of the little buttons on the ass pocket" of Bree's jean shorts.
- At the end of Dead Heat, Doug says he'd like to come back as a girl's bicycle seat.
- Jackie Mason's character in Caddyshack II, when told to "be the ball," responds with, "If I wanted to be a piece of sports equipment, I'd be a women's bicycle seat!"
- The Romeo And Juliet example is parodied in Tromeo and Juliet: Tromeo says those same lines while Juliet's gloved hands are touching her other cheeks. Shakespeare would no doubt approve of this joke.
- In Vanilla Sky Tom Cruise's character says he wants to be the mole on his girlfriend's breast.
- In With Honors, Moira Kelly calls Brendan Fraser's character into the bathroom to talk to him while she is in the shower and shaving her legs (we can partly see her through the shower curtain). Though his back is turned he can't resist checking her out in the mirror, and after leaving he remarks "Never wanted to be a razor so bad in my life."
- In Christine two teenagers watch a girl nibbling the end of a pencil, and they say how they wish they were an eraser.
- In City Slickers, two guys are watching an attractive woman riding a horse, and one of them says, "Boy, that saddle's having all the fun."
Literature
- A gender-flipped version in the novelization of Superman Returns as Kitty watches Lex Luthor "playing" with a crystal.
- An anthology of Domino Lady short stories had her team up with Airboy. At the end, she leaves a lipstick mark on Birdy and Airboy remarks that for the first time, he's actually envious of his plane.
- Dan Rhodes "The Violoncello" features a truly bizarre example, a young man actually has his soul transferred into a cello, one then given to his girlfriend, who's a music student. It doesn't end well.
- In the Burke novels, prosecutor Eva Wolfe is smoking a cigarette when she notices a man leering at her.
Man: I wish I was that cigarette.
Wolfe: So do I. (drops cigarette on the ground and crushes it under her heel) - Parlabane in The Rebel Angels sings a song about wishing he were a diamond ring "upon his lady's hand". Not romantic in the slightest - "every time she wiped her arse/I'd see the Promised Land!"
- In Looking for Alaska, Alaska uses a tube of toothpaste to give Lara and Pudge a demonstration of how to give a blowjob. Pudge reflects "never have I so wanted to be Crest Complete".
- In Mr Bean's Diary (the tie-in book to the TV series Mr. Bean), Mr Bean writes a poem saying that the one thing he would love to be Shirley Bassey's microphone, so she can sing to him. He also writes to her agent, asking for this. The agent misreads the letter, and thinks that he is asking for the microphone itself.
- In The Violet's Embryos by Angélica Gorodischer, a group of astronauts arrive at a planet whose inhabitants can use its special properties to create anything for themselves they want. They won't tell the astronauts how it's done, but one of the astronauts manages (without being able to explain how) to create a bracelet to give to his girlfriend at home. In the end it's revealed that to create something, you have to imagine being it. The one astronaut who succeeded is so in love with his girlfriend that when thinking of a bracelet for her, he immediately started thinking about how great it would be to be worn around her wrist every day.
- John Betjeman's poem Myfanwy, which was later turned word-for-word into a song by David Essex, describes the eponymous object of Betjeman's affections riding her bicycle home from a shopping trip, delivering us the line:
"Trace me your wheel-tracks, you fortunate bicycle..."
Live-Action TV
- In Just Shoot Me!, Dennis and Kevin are watching Maya's new assistant Amy drink coffee. Dennis wishes he were the coffee mug, so that she would have her lips all over him. Kevin, on the other hand, wishes he were the spoon, "so that she could pick me up by my ankles and dip me in steaming hot coffee."
- In Robin Hood Guy of Gisborne watches Marian pet her horse, at which point the Sheriff asks him: "Not envious of a horse, are you?"
- In Lizzie McGuire, Lizzie makes a remark like this regarding the helmet on Ethan Craft's head.
- During New Directions' performance of "Toxic" on Glee: "I WANNA BE THAT HAT!" (the hat in question being held in front of Mr. Schu's crotch)
- An episode of Saved by the Bell had a guy woo a girl with poetry, wishing to be her straw so that he could touch her lips. Screech sees the effectiveness and tries it on Lisa, "I wish I were the ketchup on your plate / So you could stick your french fries in my face!" Lisa crams her french fries in Screech's mouth and walks off in disgust.
- Gender Flip: In an episode of Friends when Phoebe has spontaneously developed a crush on Monica and Ross's dad, and therefore finds all the decidedly ordinary things he does sexy: "What I wouldn't give to be that can of... (looks closer) condensed milk!"
- Community has Troy and Abed both attracted to a Hot Librarian, with Troy wishing he was her book so she could flip through his pages and stop people drawing weiners in him.
- Married... with Children: While at the nudie bar, Jefferson needs to get an anniversary gift for his wife, a stripper suggests a tattoo and shows everyone hers (It's her boyfriend's name and it is somewhere that can't be shown on tv)
Ike: Oh man, I'd love to be her boyfriend.Griff: I'd love to be her boyfriend's name.
- Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt: Kimmy is catcalled by a construction worker named Mikey who wishes he were her jeans. Kimmy, a naive Womanchild, cheerfully replies that she wishes she were his yellow hat. The strange conversation makes Mikey question why he treats women that way, sparking his Coming-Out Story.
Music
- Life would be oh so sweet, if I was a bicycle seat.
- A Brazilian song was similar (also asking to be some girl's panties)
- A Brazilian song
- The old song "Cindy, Cindy":
I wish I was an appleA-hangin' on a tree,And every time my Cindy'd passShe'd take a bite of me.
- The song "Ticks": "You press your bottle to your lips, and I wish I was your beer".
- "Jealous of your Cigarette" by Hawksley Workman
I'm jealous of your cigarette
And all the things you do with it
I'm jealous of your cigarette
And how you wanna suck on it
And not me - Charlotte Martin has Keep Me In Your Pocket.
- Sergio Mendes' song "Like a Lover" is full of this trope:
"How I envy a cup that knows your lips
Let it be me, my love
And a table that feels your fingertips
Let it be me, let me be your love." - "Bang on a Piano" by Jack McManus has "And that blanket wrapped around you, wish that was me."
- "(I Wanna Be) Your Underwear" by Bryan Adams, inspired by the public reveal of a private phone call between Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles.
- Katherine Hinkson's "Irish Love Song" set to the Londonderry Air (better known as the tune to "Danny Boy.")
Would God I were the tender apple blossom
That floats and falls from off the twisted bough
To lie and faint within your silken bosom
Within your silken bosom as that does now. - The filk song Common Things by Echos Children
All these common things surround you, and my heart has no defense.
Am I mad that I might envy things with neither thought nor sense?
Even though they never know it, yet your passing lends them grace;
I would trade and count it fortune, to be standing in their place. - Toni Braxton's Spanish guitar:
I wish that I was in your arms
like that Spanish Guitar
and you could play me through the night until the dawn... - "Sugar, We're Going Down" by Fall Out Boy:
Oh don't mind me I'm watching you two from the closet
Wishing to be the friction in your jeans
- "Gasoline" by Seether has one increasingly squicky example in each verse.
- ABBA's song "Dum Dum Diddle" from the "Arrival" album:
Dum-dum-diddle, to be your fiddle
To be so near you and not just hear you
Dum-dum-diddle, to be your fiddle
I think then maybe you'd see me, baby
You'd be mine
And we'd be together all the time
Wish I was, dum-dum-diddle, your darling fiddle - From Tom Lehrer's "Masochism Tango", on the album An Evening Wasted with Tom Lehrer:
And I envy the rose
That you held in your teeth, love,
With the thorns underneath, love,
Sticking into your gums. - Garth Brooks has a song about reincarnation. And it's called "Cowgirl Saddle".
- The Now, Now song "Wolf" has a slightly morbid example of the trope:
I would kill to be the cold
Tracing your body and shaking your bones - Arctic Monkeys, "Arabella":
Wraps her lip round a Mexican CokeMakes you wish that you were the bottle
- The 18th century French song "Tendres Souhaits" ((a.k.a. Que ne suis-je la fougère) is a whole list of these (her mirror, the grass she sits on, her bathrobe after the bath, the wind to caress her cleavage, etc.). In the end the narrator concludes that "The gods that created me made me too ambitious- For in the end I want to be everything that pleases her eye".
Professional Wrestling
- More than once during Stacy Keibler's ring entrances (which involve her slowly bending over and straddling the middle rope as she steps into the ring), commentator Jerry Lawler has wished he could be the middle rope.
Theatre
- Older Than Steam: From William Shakespeare comes
See how she leanes her cheek upon her hand.O that I were a glove upon that hand,That I might touch that cheek.
"O happy horse, to bear the weight of Antony!"
Poetry
- In William Shakespeare's "Sonnet 128", the poet envies the keys of the virginal (the musical instrument very much like the harpsichord) that they are touched by the dark lady's fingers. It's very sexy and very erotic.
- It seems to have been taken down now, but there used to be a poem on deviantART expressing envy of David Bowie's microphone stand.
- The Tennyson poem The Miller's Daughter has the poet desiring to be her earring, corset, and necklace, all so that he could be close to her.
- Older Than Feudalism: in Ovid's Amores, he expresses a strong desire to be the ring on his mistresses finger.
- Likewise, in many of the poems of Catullus, he desires to be this or that belonging to his mistress, Lesbia. Most famously, he wants to be her passer or pet "sparrow." Though some believe it may not really be a sparrow.
- John Donne's "The Flea" makes it sound like he's envious that the titular parasite has been more intimate with the addressee than he has. However, rather than wallow in jealousy he uses Insane Troll Logic to justify to her why, since the same flea has bitten both of them, they've as good as had sex already so they may as well do it for real.
- Alexander Pushkin has a short poem dedicated to a tobacco sniffing girl. In the end, he states he wishes to be that tobacco, for her to spill a bit over herself.
- In this sonnet by the obscure Elizabethan poet Barnabe Barnes, the speaker wishes to be his mistress's gloves, pearls, belt, and wine — the latter so that he could have the experience of her peeing him out. (The few scholars who have written about this poem generally think he's poking fun at this trope.)
Video Games
- In Mass Effect 3, EDI gets a humanoid platform. Kenneth Donnelly notes that "if she ever accidentally walks into a wall, there's just so much padding. Wish I were a wall." The long-suffering Gabrielle Daniels says "You pretty much are, Kenneth."
Web Comics
- Nodwick: "Lucky bastard sword!". Of course, it's already a piece of metal, but what with all this "melting down" part.
- Sequential Art got this demonstrated by the Author Avatar (hamster)... and a platypus. Yes, platypus.
- Cyanide and Happiness has this. Naturally, it goes horribly wrong.
Web Original
- In the third episode of Naruto: The Abridged Comedy Fandub Spoof Series Show, Naruto spies on Sasuke, who is eating a riceball, and exclaims, "Oh my god, Sasuke is so fucking pretty! What I wouldn't give to be that riceball..."
- "I am going to get all up in his guts!"
- The subject of one Vine:
Man: What are you doing?
Woman: Smelling a rose.
Man: Uh, weird. [under his breath] I wish I was that rose...
Woman: What?
Man: I said, you're gross.
Woman: Smelling a rose.
Man: Uh, weird. [under his breath] I wish I was that rose...
Woman: What?
Man: I said, you're gross.
- On the Cheeseburger Network section So Much Pun, this arguably applies.
Western Animation
- In a sketch on Robot Chicken, a young man who's died and is going to be reincarnated has to spin a wheel to find out what he's going to be reincarnated as. One of the options is "Keira Knightley's panties". Guess which one he wants. Go on, guess.
- Lampshaded by the Monk who shows him the wheel, who sighs and gives an annoyed "everyone wishes for that one".
- American Dad!: "Let's face it, if that wishing bowl really worked, it would belong to a centuries-old Incan driving a Ferrari on his way to his job as Jessica Alba's G-string."
- Family Guy:
- Parodied by Chris
Chris: She's so pretty that if your Hacky Sack were my private parts, I'd let her do that to them.Classmate: What? Kick them around?Chris: ..Wait... ... ... ...yes.
- Peter in the Wonder Twins parody:
Peter: Form of Jayna's tampon! ...And now we play the waiting game.
- Parodied by Chris
- Adventure Time had a complex version of this that started off as:
- Comes up in a Beavis and Butt-Head episode when Beavis and Butt-Head are watching a girl eating French fries.
Butt-Head: Someday, Beavis, we'll be those fries.
- In the Grojband episode "All You Need is Cake", Trina spends most of her time crying over apparently "breaking up" with her favorite pink sweater and then regretting it, and her best friend Mina ends up envious of said sweater.
- Marvel's Spider-Man has a humorous example. After the V252 substance (AKA Venom) wreaks havoc at Tony Stark's Expo, Tony decides to take the substance with him to the Avenger's Compound. Peter remarks "Wow! I wish I were a gooey black substance; I'd get to go back to Avenger's Compound with you." Tony exits and Peter laments not getting his autograph prompting Max to ask if he's hasn't had enough awkward moments for one day.
