Something's Gotta Give

I should be writing something else, but heck, whom am I to kiss ass to when writing this blog?

(small disembodied voice: No one, Chief! Just you! No one.)

Sounding smug is the least of my admirable traits, but I'm feeling somewhat smug after the success of "Apat na Sulok ng Pag-Ibig." Of course it isn't my success to glory in; it's the success of the people who worked on it. Indeed it is more about them and probably .01% me. Shoot, if I wasn't standing around doing nothing like a loob in the first place, they would have someone else to manage the production.

So why does feeling smug come natural to me? Because, my dear Watson, we pulled the thing off, and we did quite well too, while we were at it.

Now, this whole picture isn't about a bed of roses. Naturally there are forces that push and pull when it comes to anything that goes under the heading: "ORGANIZED."

So what's the whole thing to do with this link I just provided?

Well, two people don't make a whole lot for a certain conclusion, but I find my ex-colleague Diane's story pretty much mirrored in my life. And, while I carry on with the things that I do, this portion of my life is going on somewhat neglected.

Do I mind? Yes, but only when I start watching some sappy movie. I was caught up in this mood after I watched "The Wedding Date" for the umpteenth time (Debra Messing, I love you!), and naturally the prevalent topic in my brain was a relationship. Then again, that line in the movie "Every woman has the exact love life that she wants" kept coming up. Which: a) made me think that maybe I was turning into a woman, emotionally (not the best of thoughts, I would aver) and b) kept pushing my brain back to all the wonderful opportunities I am not even aware of.

One of my friends kept setting me up with various girls in the hope that we would click. It didn't work out, and while I am very thankful, I know it just won't work that way.

Going through my own romantic history, it wasn't so much any particular effort on my part that got the girls to notice me. Mostly I just tried to be myself, though which side of me they saw I never really asked (hehe, baka mauntog, literally bumping one's head and waking up). The experience of high school was painful and it carried through the rest of my early adult life. I had the right traits of a friend, but these were the unlovable traits, but the particular anima, that active magnetism that draws people in, well, I hardly had that. For the most part, I wasn't bothered by it, it was one of those things that life deals you and you play with the hand that you're holding.

Later on, I discovered that it does. Some forms of success do depend on that kind of anima, and as I've mentioned, I didn't have it in any great quantity. That anima makes for more effective leaders, more results-oriented managers, more believable public relations people, and so on and so forth.

Where's the problem?... naturally I wanted to succeed. I want to succeed.

So now, I sit here trying to make a little extra money that I didn't have precisely because I didn't make use of the opportunities I had as best as I should. Well, that, and because there's only so much room for the kind of jobs I wanted in Manila that would pay for the kind of lifestyle to which I aspired, and would provide more security for me and my family.

So now, I'm involved with an organization that draws upon my talents, and though I'm certain that it's all worth it, the space it fills all the more accentuates what I don't have when I go home for my vacations.

So now, instead of getting excited for a vacation so I could spend more time with a Significant Other or with My Own Family I'm looking forward to getting in a little more work.

Is it all that bad? Not really. But someday, and I hope that day will be long in the making, something's gotta give.