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Dad’s Side
My nephew with cerebral palsy passed away yesterday. I was able to meet him just a few days before. When I first saw him I thought I was looking at an infant, and I was shocked to learn he was three years old. I am thankful for the brief time I had with him. I…
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The Drain
When the water falls And the empty is filled When globules of gas Take form in spheres When i am cast amid the sea And for a while, Untaken The mouth gapes wide The emptiness empties And the water spins In whirlpools of intruding orbs Spheres explode Awakened What Centripetal swirling force…
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Roma in retrospect
Memories are like Pooh Sticking on your shoe And when you keep walking Pieces fall off Until its all gone Until you step in it again. A wise Oracle once said, “I know I know nothing.” When I was a kid my daddylolo taught me to honor our ancestors because he had that good ole…
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Pasalubong
I have been preparing for a trip to my Mother Country, and have been thinking a lot of the people who made me who I am. How many lives have crossed to have me? They have crossed the seas and into mountains. My dad’s father came from a ship in China. Down my mother’s line…
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Ghosts
It has been sometime since the Day of the Dead, yet I am still thinking about ghosts. Yesterday, I watched “Bohemian Rhapsody” and woke up asking Alexa to play Queen, a ghost of a legend. I thought of the “Gone with the Wind” picture the other day about a story of a different time, and…
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Bootcamp- Day Zero
They came in as rainbows and left in military greens, struggling into sameness. The rainbows were naive initiating smiles, which later turned into tears. She had joined a corporate cult, worshiping the red white and blues of tormented history and stolen land. She had joined in a delusion, and it unraveled before her as she…
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Polarity
It isn’t that she is bipolar, it just seems that way. One moment she is singing in the rain and as happy as a songbird, next minute she is silent and depressed under a Trumpism national state of oppression. It’s not so much that she is even depressed, but more pensive about ideas of melancholy…
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Days of the Dead
Halloween and the Day of the Dead just passed. These last few weeks have just whizzed by as I have been reorganizing the household and taking on several projects simultaneously. I finally have time now to dedicate an entry to those who have passed away. My first brush with death happened when I was around…
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UC Strikes Again!
I am back at work after a very successful three day strike (October 23-25) with AFSCME 3299. Workers took a stand for issues regarding pay raises, racial inequality, and the outsourcing of labor. For UPTE-CWA, it was historical as it was our largest strike ever. Markets on campus were closed down, surgeries were delayed, and appointments…
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The Fast and Furious Life of Liz B.
“She was the kind of girlfriend God gives you young, so you’ll know loss the rest of your life.” ~ Junot Díaz, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao She was my roommate and bestie. She stripped at the place where there were hundreds of beautiful girls and one ugly one. But Liz was not…