I really grow tired of this place sometimes. Sure, perhaps you’d like to think that arguably the greatest professional athlete of all time has a pretty cushy life but there are occasions when I feel my status is nothing more than a burden to me. Anyone can understand that being constantly bombarded by the press and by millions of kids for autographs gets a little tedious now and again. Have you ever opened your front door and been flashed in your dressing gown? It starts to irritate, much like an itchy scalp does, after a while. Thankfully though, I’m not a nudist. I guess life could be worse, right?

Of course it could. I’m not Dominic Pericolo.

Maybe my problem is greater than Pericolo though. I can’t simply place the blame solely on characters like him because despite his blatant contribution to world idiocy – he’s not the source of the problem. I’m bored with it all. This damn routine that I find myself locked in day in day out. Change is a great thing and there’s never enough of it.

It’s just the same thing over and over.

Repeat with me. Wake. Work. Sleep. Repeat. Underwear. Pants. Shirt. Why does everything have to be the same? Maybe I’m not the only one that’s being driven to insanity by a circle of utterly mundane and meaningless exercises. Maybe I am. However, I could care less about the rest of the world. The fact is that I’ve got a problem with the way that life on this Planet operates.

You’re all just too damn boring.

We’re living in a world that’s governed by unnecessary rules that have been put into place to stop our freedom from evolving. Why do people look towards their wrist before considering whether or not to make a meal? Time manipulates us all and forces us to construct our day in a completely different manner as to how we’d ideally choose to spend it. We’re not in control of anything really. We’re just part of a system that has no starting or ending point. It just is. Clock work.

Tick-bloody-tock.

I remember that there was once a time when I gained an adrenaline rush from simply waking up in the morning. There used to be something refreshing about picking myself up from the bottom of my bed and rolling outside into the sunshine. I could almost taste the possibilities that a new day brought. It was almost as if walking out of my front door was like climbing Everest and screaming obscenities at hikers below. Yes, I get kicks from that sort of thing too.

But something changed. My routine was broken. The happiness was stolen from my heart and the world suddenly became a dark place. I never could really put my finger on just why I’d become such a bitter and twisted person but maybe that’s a good thing. I’ve been left to search for the answers; they’ve not been handed to me on a plate. So, I set off on a new quest to try and decipher just why my paradise had turned into a wasteland. The candle flickered out as my ambition to make the Earth a wonderful place fell by the wayside.

I don’t think there was one incident that stood above the rest that drove me from harmony either. Time itself played a significant role as the days passed by and humanity continued to ensure that the bleak winters were prolonged past the point of return. So now, as our Planet is trying to shuffle through the snow, I wonder why I was foolish enough to believe that I could break the trend. Could I have done this? Maybe I should have done that, perhaps?

The truth is that we might already be beyond rescue.

The world has evolved too much now. We’re stuck in a constant cycle of idiocy. When will the general public understand that I don’t want to be pestered for an autograph when I’m taking women out for dinner? Why should I be forced to hand over my signature whilst tucking into a three course meal? Manners are a thing of the past. The world knows no shame anymore. It’s just another example of how polluted our world has become. The filth of society show their faces regularly at my doorstep in the hope that I’ll pity them and reward them with a freebie.

If you want my autograph then I’m going to make you pay for it and I don’t take cheques either.

It amazes me that the common man has the cheek to actually approach me on the street though. When I was growing up, we actually respected not just our elders but, also, our superiors. If you analyse the way that society is actually governed, then you’d have to place me in the top bracket of people. The guys that actually make the world tick. We’re the ones that the mere mortals look up to from afar. I don’t have to work what you’d consider ‘normal’ hours for my occupation. I come and go as I please through choice.

Choice is something that most people don’t have too.

Normal men are forced into working 9-5 jobs that take over their lives and enslave them as mindless zombies that have seemingly lost the presence of mind to think rationally. Can’t they understand that they’re trapped and that I’m not? That’s what gives me the power over them. That’s why I have authority over them…because I’m different. Oh so very different.

I don’t have to reduce myself to becoming John Smith from the bottom of the street. My pride prevents me from working in some run of the mill office job before returning home to feed the cat at approximately quarter past nine. I don’t want to make small talk with little old Maggie Haughton over the garden fence and comment on how her tulips are sprouting up nicely. I’ve never been like that and there’s a part of my personality that refuses to accept the mundane role of a common worker. I’m claustrophobic and I thrive from the freedom that my status gives me.

It always makes me laugh when people complain about their jobs too. They moan and whinge but at the end of the day they’re the ones that took the work on. If they didn’t like that particular route in life then there was no real need to walk it. Therefore, you’d have to say that either society is nothing more than a collection of people that are gluttons for punishment or that it’s composed of idiots of the highest calibre. I think there’s an argument somewhere in the middle personally. The most fascinating thing about people confined to the 9-5 life are totally and utterly illogical.

You only need to look as far as any HWF show to understand that fact. When I walk out onto the arena floor and gaze around the crowd, I do not hear my name being chanted. No. Instead, the booing seems to send the arena into over drive as the negativity about the place picks up and forces the masses to show their hate for me. Sometimes I’m even pelted by bits of paper and, if I’m lucky, maybe even a can of diet coke or two. What these people fail to realise is that, by buying a ticket to come and watch the HWF super stars in action, they’re paying my wages. That’s why I usually have a slight smile upon my face as I look out at the sea of people that fill the arenas across America. I’m very much in control. I don’t need some stupid managerial position to tell me that I’ve got power over people.

Mangers actually make me laugh in a sense though. They spend every minute of their working life trying to ensure that the people below them are doing their jobs correctly. They actually believe that they’ve got some kind of power and that their status gives them genuine freedom. However, although cases like this do exist, they’re in the minority. There will always be an overriding span of control. There’s always going to be someone above Joe Bloggs ready to sack him at first sight of complacency. That’s not freedom. It’s just a cage with invisible bars.

Wait a minute. Doesn't that place me in the same boat then?