Life of Manuel – Page 3 – This is my plot twist

Monday Blues

September 23, 2024

Note

I often hit Monday and just hit a blank. I’ve got zero motivation or interest. My mind is blah. I sit and stare at my screen, moving between social media, news websites and emails mindlessly numbing myself to look busy throughout the day.

I go into the weekly management meeting pretty much a mute. I sit there hoping that I don’t need to be involved. Hoping I don’t get any questions.

What the fuck is wrong with me?

Am I just completely de-motivated by my job? If I was building my own company or doing my own thing would I be more passionate?

Or is just because I wrecked myself on Friday and Saturday night?

I don’t think it’s the weekend. It’s bigger than that. It’s the fucking mess of a working life I’ve got myself into. I hate working for my old man.
Wake Up Without Worry

September 23, 2024

Note

I woke up on the sofa with a hangover. I still had a dead keen attitude to play tennis though. And so I did. I got my bro, Erkan, over and we smashed around for a power hour. It was so warm that I managed to pop my tee off and break into a solid sweat. Chasing each ball down like it was the winning point.

It’s funny playing without our tennis coach around. Erkan moans about the fact that I don’t hit the ball directly to him. Lazy bum. Whereas, if the coach is around he moves to the ball like a pro. Maybe he’s just trying to show off and flirt with the coach?

When I returned to the house and into the shower, the worries of the evening before were gone. My wife gave me a smile and a kiss. A nod of acknowledgement that the evening before’s indiscretion is behind us.

I’m so happy to put nights like that behind us and then be able to enjoy the Sunday. We took the kids for lunch and had a gay old time.

Cheers to everything being all ok in the world of my wife and I.
Everything Was Happy

September 22, 2024

Note

She was happy. She was contributing to the family. She was acknowledging the family and time I put in. She was interacting with us all. She was being controlled with her evenings.

Then bang I reply to her about saying she feels like she should only work four days a week. I say I’m so impressed with how she can take so much time to travel and it’s almost like she does four days a week.

She makes me feel like shit. She says I’m implying that she should be working five days a week.

Ummm no that’s not what I said. I was trying to be positive. Maybe I came across the wrong way?

She works her ass off. But fuck yes she takes the benefits of it because of that exact reason.

I love her to bits and in everything I do I try to support her and never cross her.

I feel sad and yes I do feel under appreciated.
The Teddy Bear Room

September 20, 2024

Note

It was always about the teddy bear room. Whenever any of my friends came over they wanted to see it. My mum had a collection of teddy bears amassing to over a thousand cuddly bears organised as neatly as a teddy bears picnic all in one room. Her teddy bear collection is a symbol of who she was.

She had little bears. She had big bears. She had original Steiff bears worth over a hundred thousand dollars. Mum was a true enthusiast.

Her love of teddy bears is a true reflection of the warm, cuddly person she was.

Her hugs always surrounded you. They made you feel like everything was ok. She was always there for you, just like a teddy bear is. She always put you first. She was humble, caring and loving. Her arms were open to everyone.

She is now a teddy bear angel looking over us. She will forever be remembered as the teddy bear maestro.
How I Met My Hot Wife

September 19, 2024

Note

Fourteen years ago I pressed my wife up against the wall and bar pashed her. Ironically, she’s fourteen years older than me. I had recently returned from my overseas experience, and a friend of my gay brother suggested I hook up with Juliet.

I was comfortably tucked in bed watching a movie when the text message from Dick came through. “Hey buddy, we’re down at Rockpool. Come for drinks with Juliet.”

I leaped out of bed like an energiser bunny, put my cheap youthful looking jacket on with a hood stitched into it. A pump of cologne and off I went.

Walked straight into the restaurant full of confidence and put my arm around her. There was a nervous sexual energy. She looked at me with a surprised yet intrigued look. We both knew we’d been set up. We both knew it would be fun.

We drank and drank. I slammed my brand spanking new credit card down on the bar as we downed Petrone shots. The opportunity came knocking. I pressed her up against the wall, leaned in closer and let the tip of my tongue slip in. At first it was short, we leaned back and smirked at each other, then our tongues lashed in a little deeper.

She argued “I don’t go home with people on the first night” as I promptly jumped in her taxi. The night was sealed, but the wife was not.

I knew we’d be together. The way she told me “I’ve never met anyone like you” was so cliche. The smitten face she had. It told my heart everything I needed to know.

It took me three weeks before I saw Juliet again. The tale continues…

Till next time. Romeo
No Pain, No Gain

September 18, 2024

Note

Today my therapist taught me about why choosing short term pain will make me the man I aspire to be.

When you face challenging situations that question your values, you are essentially given two choices; ‘away’ or ‘towards’.

Your values are what you aspire to be. Do you want to run your own company? Be in charge of your own destiny? Do you want to be seen as a man or a mouse?

When you act ‘away’ from your values, it’s the easiest route. You’re kicking the can down the road. It eliminates the pain and problem. But it does move you further away from your true aspirations.

By acting ‘towards’ your values, you’re faced with a pain that’s uncomfortable. It’s tough and it will be fucking hard in the short term. But ultimately, leaning into it brings you toward your values.

So, when the time comes to face your next challenging situation. Ask yourself – “who do I want to be?”

Think about turning ‘towards’ the longer term values you aspire to be. Consider, taking the short term hit. It will hurt at first but the longer term pay off is that alluring fulfilment that we all so desire to feel.

For example I want to rid myself of working for Franz and the family business.

The short term is easy, I take the salary and continue living in the cyclical nature of his bi polar craziness. Him dipping in and out of blazing confusions. Throwing his toys at me and everyone else.

When he’s manic, he becomes completely lost from reality and absolutely unreasonable to work with. He leaves a trail of carnage.

So what do I do? I wait for him to settle down into a depression. I wait for him to go back into a haze of smoking ounces of weed.

Once he’s there I no longer have to speak to him for months. All my pain goes away. But through this nature I’ve kicked the can further down the road from my dream of running my own business.

I need to face into starting something of my own. I need to make the leap and free myself from the shackles of his narcissistic manipulation.

When the day comes, I’ll lean in, and I can feel it. It’s really going to hurt. But I keep assuring myself it will only be for a short while.

I’ll graduate to what everyone in the world gets as a birth right. The day they tell their old man to FUCK OFF!

I’m confident I can muster up the courage to choose short term pain to achieve long term gain. If I don’t then what does that make me -a man or a mouse?

I choose to take charge of my own destiny. How about you?
The Way I Am

September 17, 2024

Note

Franz told me he understands the way I am. With all his mighty wisdom he thinks I’m too soft because I grew up in an environment of people who supported me. From my mother Hedwig, my sister Yvonne, and brothers Erkan and Peter.

Fuck I was so lucky to have them. Particularly with a narcissistic beast of man that my father Franz is.

What Franz fails to acknowledge is the fact that I did grow up with a father who was reckless and unpredictable. He’s predictably unpredictable. He is manipulative.

The kind of guy who would take his newly adopted son to a strip club and offer to buy him a blowjob under the table.

The stories about old man Franz are endless. Who the fuck is he to think I grew up in a soft environment? Maybe it was? But he’s the fucker that makes me think I was hard done by.

He’s no model father to me. He made me who I am, but to the antithesis of who he is and the tithesis of my mother.
The Curse of the Shoulder

September 16, 2024

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I’ve been punished by the gods. My left shoulder and its connecting tissue has been ripped raw. The injury has been ravished over and over as I continue to throw myself into physical and fun situations.

About three months ago a car pulled out in front of my Vespa as I was hooning toward the Holy Trinity Church in Parnell.

Everything slowed down for a few split seconds. I told myself to relax, and to roll. I flew superman style into the air and promptly judo rolled through the middle of the intersection before coming to a halt flat on my back.

My shit was everywhere and the bike was in pieces. I was ushered off the road and straight past a couple of 10 year old boys with their jaws dropped. “Are you ok?” they said.

“I’m fine, but are you ok?” I replied.

Four months later and no I’m not fine. My fucking shoulder won’t get better and I can’t do everything like I used to.

Is it age? Or is it a ridiculous curse?
Hello world!

September 11, 2024

Note

Yes, that’s right. It’s my first post. My first journey into the public foray of journaling and keyboard bashing through incognito.

My pseudonym is Manuel and my shrink is called Michelle. She’s probably not going to feature much in here but my wife highly likely will.

My goal is to write a hundred words a day. To share an insight, frustration, emotion or story from my present, current or future self.

I don’t want anyone to figure out who I am. I want to entertain and be free from the shackles of public opinion.

I want to share my own opinion. Really dig into them because my shrink told me I should take a stance. Choose a side. She told me that it’s ok that not everybody likes me and that it won’t make me a bad person.