Author: exangel83

Yesterday, my maternal grandmother Felicidad Evangelista Mainit passed away from a sickness. She will be tested for COVID when she is embalmed, and for these next 9 days she will be held in vigil. She joins my grandfather, Victoriano, her three sons, and her granddaughter Lhordgen.
She was a kind, sweet, beautiful, darling of a woman, and she will be dearly missed by all who knew her. She had eight children in her life, and many grandchildren and great-grandchildren. I will try to find out how many to be exact. The reason I don’t know, is because there is a language barrier and that side of the family resides in the Philippines. However, a couple weeks ago I decided to switch my Rosetta Stone app to Tagalog and start learning, and boy; it’s a lot easier than Japanese.
The sadder part of me echoes, “Too little, too late.” & goes on to remind me that I skipped out on my opportunity to go to the Philippines when I had the money before COVID because I never got around to getting my passport reissued. Remembering to do things is a constant struggle with schizophrenia. If it’s not a habit, or have an alarm set for it, it’s a tossup if I’ll remember.

C’mon, self. That’s no way to reflect. That may be true but that’s not honoring her memory. Just be grateful she had access to FaceTime in her family over there for the memories you do have because of how hard it is to remember as far back as 1998 and 1987.

My last definite memory of Felicidad was of her 91st birthday party, which I got to observe via FaceTime. It was such a grand feast, and a great cake, but I remember her having trouble blowing out the candles.
15 minutes later–
I talked to my aunt Lily on Facebook and got some photos from the party.

I have a foggy memory of a video chat with her since then, and it’s of her being outside the house along with the man on the left in the picture above, Victoriano Mainit Jr.

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I continue to be grateful that my dad is alive despite all the things his body is going through; is able to communicate, and earn a living. I thank God he has friends who are there for him so that he can get by without a caregiver.

Jeremy is coming to visit in mid-February. Woooo!

So I’m 38 now, and my father recently celebrated his 75th birthday. He has been keeping in touch with me weekly telling me stories or answers to questions that I have been recording. It’s been a truly wonderful experience getting the recording set up.

I’m using TapeACall Pro and I think the yearly $20 price for hosting is fair. There is a way to download and share the files.

Soon I will start BioFit. I’m anxious about phase 1 which is the first month having 100g of fiber a day to help the gut flora with the new probiotics. I’m just not used to eating food in that kind of quantity and I have been doing research on foods (artichoke, boiled carrots, black beans, split peas, and chickpeas are my favorites). I’m really optimistic about the product but I cannot easily do my own grocery shopping. So my lifestyle is going to change. I’m thinking about going for a morning walk every day and wearing my Apple watch again. At least this morning. I’m going this morning. I have to keep visualizing myself feeling healthy and looking prime and I will keep wanting to walk.

and a lot of the recipes look good.

in February, I got back together with Jeremy Castle from Indiana. Spending time with him pretty much daily has been great. In order to interact over the distance, we play Animal Crossing together.

In late March, I started working on a blog for my dad’s CojoTruk. It has been a very positive experience being able to help my dad out. I have enjoyed learning what I can about it.

Gonna get COVID vaccine shot 2 next week.

Recalled memories of Cool Creek camp up by Redding and how they had Marion berries growing as well as a trip lowfering when I was 6 where I camped in a tent by Santa Cruz.

fortunately, I’ve heard from my dad. With Jon’s help I got some recordings of his lectures online at http://www.gravity.cc/dave which are what my dad needed help with. I encourage you to have a listen.

I spoke to my father for what is probably the last time this evening as he goes into hospice care with ALS and colon cancer. He is losing blood and can’t sleep which is awful because he hasn’t been able to eat for nearly a month and has been subsisting on juice and sugar. My heart is heavy. He is not gone yet but he’s said good bye.

There were two deaths in my mom’s side of the family recently, one was my cousin Lhordgen who was my age and the other was my auntie Connie who was 85.

I’ve been wanting to start selling my jewelry too but the research I’ve done is saying etsy is not good for artists. Hmm. I might have to get a lightbox tent or something to take some nicer photographs of my jewelry for marketing.

This past Wednesday was a milestone for me. It marked the first time I got paid to take photos. I really love working with Lamar and TruComposure, they are a great band and I recommend checking them out, they have music on their website.

I’m parched, deserted
dry wind
you, too, are,
father harmony,
collecting these
grains of sand
to erode the clock
from me.

— self, 2003-04ish

attempt #2 to write a blog entry today. attempt #1 was unable to publish for unknown reasons.

had a great new year’s party with Crystal and Joann despite some awful champagne. missed the ball drop due to the cable not working initially after i had to reconnect it because we’d hooked up a raspberry pi to watch movies before midnight. we watched part of Ad Astra but the file was corrupt. Then we watched A Scanner Darkly and Six-String Samurai. I spent way too much time smoking Nat Sherman MCD’s under the stars but fortunately it was well spent mostly recalling tales with Crystal. I connected a little bit with Joann too. All in all I had a great time.

planning to go to Prescott next week with Crystal, I really want to see Josh’s new game store, meet up with Chris and see my old city.

Past, present, and future are One. I pray this is a good year for me.

typing words into a screen. this time it’s a raspberry pi 4 desktop kit and it’s really cute, i’ve gotta admit. there’s no case on the board, but i’ll get one on tuesday. it’s kinda cool having this teeny circuitboard with wires haphazardly jutting out of it sitting on my desk.

in other news, i’ve written some poetry. i’m ambivalent about sharing it with the internet yet though. nerves. oh well.