1. Dreamed that, I'm in the bedroom and hear animal noises outside. Then I hear a knocking sound at the window. I'm nervous about what I'll see, but I feel I the need to check it out. I look out and see a blue jay in a tree. A little farther away is a kookaburra on a branch.
I had this dream soon after hearing an owl outside.
I think the dream was very positive. I'm scared of something, but it turns out to be benign. Not only is it benign, but I love birds. And of course, seeing an Australian bird in my backyard would be a huge treat.
I also had this dream that I'm not going to try to explain, because it's confusing. But in it, my boyfriend was played by Damien Walsh-Howling. This is not another way of saying, I dreamed that Damien Walsh-Howling was my boyfriend. The dream was one of those confusing dreams where the storyline was sort of happening to me, but yet, at the same time, it was a fictional thing with actors playing the parts.
See what I mean by confusing? You probably don't have any idea what I'm talking about.
When I woke up, though, I started to have doubts about the Damien Walsh-Howling thing. I get him confused with Damon Gameau, and started to think maybe the boyfriend was played by Gameau and not Walsh-Howling.
2. Remembered that the boyfriend was actually a soon-to-be ex-boyfriend. He dumped me and started dating a ghost. Maybe?
It's all a bit confusing.
3. Started to watch an episode of Home and Away.
4. Decided the number one character on my Home and Away shit list is now Nate (Kyle Pryor).
Evie (Philippa Northeast) probably comes in second.
5. Annoyed at Ricky (Bonnie Sveen) for not accepting shopping and cleaning help from her roommates. She has a new baby and wants to take care of things herself.
Parenting a baby or young child can be extremely hard and exhausting. It would be nice if Home and Away showed that it doesn't make a mother weak if she accepts help or asks for help.
That being said, this might be what they're going for. Maybe they're showing Ricky refusing help, because she's ignorant about how difficult it's going to be. In the scene where she refuses help, the baby was very quiet and peaceful. Now he's crying. So maybe Ricky will see she needs to have a change in attitude.
6. Saw Nate and Kat (Pia Miller) ordering at the cafe. The waitress asks for their drink order, and Nate says to Kat, Coffee or juice? Why does he need to say that to her? Isn't Kat smart and mature enough to look at the menu, know what's available, and tell the waitress herself?
I've dealt with behavior like this from my dad. I think it's controlling. Or something....
There's the attitude of needing to take charge—the belief that if they don't personally handle things, the world will fall to pieces. What needs to be done won't get done.
Yeah, the drink thing is a small thing. It might be innocent. Or it could be a symbol or symptom of bigger things.
7. Thought that I probably wouldn't have even noticed the drink thing if Nate wasn't currently numero uno on my shit list.
8. Heard Ricky saying she's a single mom and therefore can't rely on anyone.
Unfortunately, that's probably true...at least in most cases.
But if, on a rare moment, someone does offer help, it's not a bad idea to take it. Well, it depends on who they are, what they're offering, and if you think their help will actually be helpful.
When Jack was a baby, he had severe stranger and separation anxiety, so someone offering to hold him wasn't usually very helpful to me. It just made things more stressful.
9. Started watching another episode of Home and Away.
10. Thought scene with Brax (Stephen Peacocke) meeting his infant son, for the first time, in prison is very bittersweet.
It's one of those things in life that make you more depressed by giving you a glimpse of happiness.
Maybe a similar thing would be taking a terminally ill child to Disney World. Of course that's fun and wonderful but watching your child look happy and knowing they might die soon? I imagine that's incredibly depressing. Plus, there's the fact that the child might not be feeling well. They might have less energy than the healthy kids at Disney World. That might make the families feel depressed as well.
I think with the prison thing and the Disney World thing, there wouldn't just be depression. There would be some joy. Probably.
It reminds me of scene in my old favorite book, Alex the Life of a Child.
Alex, a young girl with Cystic Fibrosis, and her father are having fun making an answering machine recording. Alex stops and says something like, Daddy, wouldn't this have been great?
It's good that Brax gets to meet his infant son in prison, but it would have been GREAT if he got to be with his son at home.
11. Felt compelled to admit that this episode is making me cry a little.
It's not just the prison stuff.
Ricky named the baby after Brax and Kyle's dead brother Casey. I got very teary-eyed when Ricky revealed the name to Kyle (Nick Westaway). Then she walked away and started crying.
When there are scenes that are making me cry, sometimes I wonder if the scene has made the actor cry as well. Instead of having to think of their childhood dog being put to sleep, they can just think of the scene itself to make themselves cry.
12. Thought about the manipulation stuff I've been reading this week when watching a scene between Billie (Tessa de Josselin) and Phoebe (Isabella Giovinazzo).
I think Billie is a major manipulator. She gets what she wants, or TRIES to get what she wants by lying and tricking her victims into thinking they're the one with the problem.
Billie wants Kyle. In today's episode, she aims for this by telling him that Phoebe has moved on with Chris (Johnny Ruffo). Why does she say this? Because she saw Phoebe giving Chris a music lesson. Apparently that equals them being an item.
When the news comes round to Phoebe, she confronts Billie. She asks Billie not to pass on rumors without first getting the facts. Billie than says, You'll do anything to stop him from being happy. Won't you? You don't want him, but you don't want anyone else to have him.
Phoebe replies that she doesn't care what Kyle does.
Billie asks, Then why did you turn him against me?
I've seen this with manipulative people. You make one criticism or request and they blow it up out of proportion. Not wanting Billie to pass on false information about Phoebe has suddenly turned into Phoebe not wanting Kyle to be happy and Phoebe turning Billie against Kyle.
Then Billie says, You just love being stuck inside of his head, don't you? You are a cold, selfish cow. And you don't deserve him.You're a horrible person.
In the stuff I've been reading lately, this psychologist (George Simon) talks about how one of the main targets of the manipulator is the neurotic person. The neurotic person has fragile self-esteem, and it's easy for them to fall prey to what the manipulator is telling them. I don't know if Phoebe is like that. If she is, she'll start believing what Billie has said to her. Or at least she'll start questioning it. Am I cold and selfish? Do I not want Kyle to be happy? Am I horrible?
I'm not on Phoebe's side in terms of her being angry at Kyle. He slept with Billie when they had broken up. To me, that's Kosher. For Phoebe, it's not. Regardless, I don't think Phoebe's anger about that makes her a horrible person. It doesn't make her cold and selfish.
13. Thought that since I'm interested in manipulation lately, I'll have fun watching Billie.
I think she's a very manipulative character.
14. Thought that Leah (Nicodemou) might be a good example of a neurotic character. In the last episode I watched, she started expressing doubts about her decision to turn the stolen ATM money into the police.
In the episode before that, she had felt she was doing the right thing. Nate felt otherwise and let her know that. I think Nate's viewpoint got to Leah and she started second guessing herself. Fortunately, the very person she got in trouble with the ATM money was the one who got her to see that she hadn't done anything wrong.
Now disagreeing with someone's actions, and speaking up about them doesn't make a person manipulative.
There's just things that Nate has done lately that make me wonder.
If he IS a manipulator, I think he'd be a much more successful one than Billie. Billie's obnoxious and annoying. Her manipulation is almost too obvious to work.
Nate, on the other hand, is charming. He's very handsome. He has the British accent. He's a doctor. He can act very sweet and caring at times. I think it would be easier for him to persuade people to do what he wants than it would be for Billie.
15. Wondered if Nate is a manipulative person, and if so, could he be even worse than Billie?
16. Wanted to mention that I don't agree with everything I've read from George Simon, the psychologist.
From what I read his work, he seems to think manipulative people are bad seeds. They're missing a conscience, or they have one but it's very minimal. I get the sense that he sees manipulators as cold-hearted monsters.
I don't believe that's true. For example, I think Nate is basically a good guy. I think he does care about people. It's just he MIGHT be prone to using manipulative tactics to get what he wants.
Billie is an annoying brat but not a cold hearted monster. I think she's very needy.
You know what? I think THAT is the key to manipulative people. I think they're especially needy. Because they're needy, they'll use desperate and manipulative methods to get what they want. They'll lie. They'll deny. They'll twist the facts. They'll lay the blame on others. They'll exaggerate. They'll use gaslighting tactics, etc.
What do they need? It depends on the person. Some might want wealth. Some might want to be at the top of their career. Others might want love, popularity, celebrity-status, etc.
Then there are some who have an excessive need to maintain their very high esteem. If you try to break through their armor of self-love, they'll put up quite a fight.
17. Thought that what Billie wants most is love. I think it's as simple as that.
If Nate is manipulative, I'm not sure what he wants.
Actually, I think he might actually have more noble desires. Maybe he wants to help others—protect his family and friends.
18. Remembered when I was a teenager. I went around collecting sponsorship for a Cystic Fibrosis event. When people said no, I put little papers under their door saying things like, Why don't you want to help save the lives of 30,000 children?
My heart was definitely in the right place, but my actions were still cruel and manipulative.
Raising money for sick children is a good thing, but it's really not right to try to make people feel bad in the process.
It's good of Nate to want to help the people close to him, but it's not okay that he pressure his girlfriend to go against her police job.
19. Thought about the desires of manipulators, and decided most of them probably want multiple things. I imagine it's rare for someone to want JUST wealth or just fame. They probably want as many goodies as possible—love, wealth, fame, popularity, self-worth....
I don't think everyone who wants these things is manipulative. I think most of us want at least SOME of those things. It's just about how you go about trying to get them.