updates to site...

 I have been through the main page and updated my bio and other fields including the Check It Out section. Some sites were no longer pertinent, some were dead, and some needed updated links. With time I will add more links of interest. I hope some of them will be of use or interest to you, too.

thoughts on gofundme...

 As I have mentioned in recent posts, my mother and I were in serious financial trouble. With the retirement liquidated for the house, we were no longer benefiting from a monthly allowance that was critical to our expenses. At some point it was apparent to me that we were in a desperate position and I tallied several sets of figure based on the last few months and concluded that we only had about five to seven months of money remaining in our bank account. This was scary- really, really scary. if we couldn't afford to stay in our room anymore what were we going to do? My mother's SSDI monthly income was not enough to cover all our expenses. In fact, it only covered the cost of the room and nothing else, which meant pulling from the liquidated retirement to afford basic necessities like groceries, prescriptions, laundry, etc. We were (and still are) putting off other necessities like doctor visits, dental visits, ophthalmologist visits, hernia surgery, and more. 

Some people had recommended using a service like GoFundMe to plea for money, which made me feel uncomfortable. Unfortunately, push came to shove and I felt I had to ignore my discomfort and create an account there. I saw some success stories, so I developed some hope that maybe this resource could save us. IT DIDN'T. For months I did as recommended and posted to social media. The only thing I couldn't do was for my own personal team because I didn't know enough people to help me out with spreading the word even further. To date, I have had only one donation of $50. After I had been through all this, a friend of mine said these things rarely work even if you have a lot of connections and international awareness. I felt bad- discouraged because a stranger in my city made more that they needed and I didn't make enough; not even for one month's needs, annoyed that among the people I know and are acquainted with that only one person who could barely afford to help was so generous as to give me that donation, and I lost hope and fell deeper into despair, wondering what was to become of me and my mother.

so now maybe you see...

 In the last five posts I have briefly described what's been happening for the better half of a decade. This is what been going on in my life and this is what has led to me not posting sooner. I have thought about it several times, but have had such a hard time actually writing about it. I only have  a handful of friends who  also know what I have been going through. A lot of it is so hard to talk about. There has been so much to experience in such a short amount of time and most of it has been nothing but loss to such an extreme... 

There were times when I worried if we really would be homeless; I had wondered if having nowhere to go and losing everything that we had left what would happen- would we kill ourselves. Life can really be scary and incredibly dark sometimes. It's odd to consider the concept of suicide without being suicidal- much like the tales of when an Indian gets too old he leaves his tribe to go die alone... It really leaves on to think: if you have nothing left in life and do have a place to stay, things to do, losing all possessions, no income, no family, then what do you do? What are your options? What can you realistically do? I have contemplated this question many times. Until I have nothing left, I will keep on trying...

The contemplation of life and when it can and/or should end from a practical view reminds me of a similar deep and extended contemplation I had back in 2004 when a very tumultuous relationship I had struggled to maintain for years came crashing to a nerve-racking end, complete with a royal mind game not once, but twice. That time led me to extended contemplation of several issues: what am I willing to tolerate, what should I not tolerate, to what extent should I tolerate something if I am willing to tolerate it, how do I identify my boundaries and limitations, what is my identity, how do I keep in touch with my identity and not allow myself to lose my identity for any reason- including pleasing another, if I lose my identity do I attempt to reclaim it or redefine myself, and how do I define myself, among others. I was so emotionally and spiritually lost in myself that I lost functionality. I had to ponder these things because I was in a quandary like when when I encountered vision problems and could no longer view imagery in fine detail, which was what my academic training was primarily for- it was like, what do I do now that I can't see well anymore. So once again I was in a situation where I felt uncertain of things that felt pretty important to me that I didn't feel like I had the answers to anymore. I like to feel self-sufficient and when I feel a complete lack of control over my life, physical abilities, or whatever, It's pretty unsettling to me. So with everything that has happened lately, I have been in that mode again .

meanwhile, other issues were occurring simultaneously...

 When our home flooded, we lost all mail received to that point that had been either set aside or recently arrived. Unfortunately, this also included many tax-related documents required for completing the most recent taxes due. Equally as unfortunate, when you are facing a crisis it becomes hard to concentrate on all the things you normally would plus the crisis at hand. As such, reacquiring the tax documents that were damaged fell to the back burner somewhat. 

My uncle has a tax preparer who has done my mother's taxes since my grandparents both died and resulted in a change in how her taxes needed to be prepared. Ever since, traditionally documents would go to my uncle who would then give them to his preparer. We didn't know that at the time he was falling behind on his taxes as well as ours and the tax preparer wasn't getting in touch with us. We had no idea what was happening until about 2020. I did what I could to get all documents to my uncle and request documents to be resent to us, which was no easy task. Because my uncle was also dealing with personal matters including moving to a new place, it was implied that I should deal with my uncle's tax preparer directly. Again, this turned out to be a little challenging; not only do I not have the rapport with him that my uncle does, but I feel like I am getting less than professional service as a stranger (perhaps he formed opinions of me and my mother arbitrarily?). He takes a bout a week to reply to me each time even though this is not the busy season for him, he gives me generic letters that don't make any sense when all I need to know is if there's anything left to submit to him, which it turned out there was one thing I gave my uncle to give to him in December that never was turned over. Fortunately, the 2019 taxes were finally completed this month, but because of the expenses of the house repairs, it was deemed that she would owe a LOT of money on her taxes which hardly seemed fair at all, especially because it was they first year where laws had changed that disasters like ours couldn't be written off unless it was a federally declared regional issue. We ended up owing over 50k- far more than we ever owed before and we didn't have the spare money so we had to dip into mom's newly replenished retirement again. We still have to process the next year and I am afraid of what that might be because we continued to spend on house repairs...

While we have been using hotels, my uncle has retired as a professor and moved to Texas to be with his daughter. she encouraged him and he accepted. he gave up a nice neighborhood, a great house, many possessions, and local friends to move many states away to a prefab cabin that's about a quarter the size of what he had and his daughter takes advantage of him regularly. He lets it happen so he can only blame himself, really. My mother and I have encourage him to stand up for himself and suggest various ways to deal with matters them might be less aggressive yet get his point across, but he doesn't want to make waves. Now, his daughter has decided to move and he has to move, too, because his prefab cabin is on her property. Thus ensues a whole new slew of troubles for him. He wants to talk about his issues, naturally, but when we react to the outrageous troubles he has, he gets uncomfortable. You could sat that his daughter's actions have a trickle down effect. We have known about this for years but it only seems to get worse and now that she's an adult it's less excusable and less correctable. We don't have good relations with her and I'm all too happy to not have to deal with her and I imagine when my uncle dies I won't have to deal with her again.

My great uncle passed away in late 2019. We we informed after the fact even though were are only one state away and would have wanted to be there for him during his final hours. We weren't informed of his funeral services or where his remains would be laid to rest. There's been no closure. No future graveside visits won't be possible, either. To top things off, a woman we never knew contacted only my uncle about this, not my mother who is the older sibling. She did not leave a lot of details such as her name or contact information. She simply told my uncle that my great uncle had lived with her for the past 40 or so years and that she had been with him when he died, which I think she failed to mention cause of death. He had multiple ailments so it would have been nice to know what it was. This was a particularly curious thing to learn about this woman because my great uncle had never mentioned that he was living with her or even had a relationship- especially so because he was separated but not divorced...

Another thing that occurred since we have been living in hotels is the passing of Pogo. I don't recall at the moment if I ever blogged bout him before, but Pogo was our dog, but he was so much more than just a dog. He joined our family when he was just a hair over two weeks old. He was weened from his mother too early hand had early separation anxiety. he was originally just a pet and family member, but through the bonds forged he ended up becoming my mother's service dog, too. He sensed when she was  having sleep apnea attacks, when she was having having partial complex seizures, and she sensed things about me too like when I was having HS attacks which included painful cysts. We always stayed with him and he always stayed with us; we saved each other reciprocally and regularly. We had him with us for over 17 wonderful years, but ten minute before Valentine's Day 2020 we had to take him to and emergency vet where he was put to sleep in my mother's arms. He had acute renal failure that couldn't be treated and he couldn't be saved; his body functions were already shutting down and he wasn't responding to any treatments. I was the most heart breaking think I have ever gone through, including losing family members, relationships, and filing for bankruptcy. Even now it's still heartbreaking; my mother and I miss him terribly and we still cry, but we think we want another dog when we move into our new home. We hope to have another opportunity to have such a mutually wonderful relationship.

and eventually we got a new home...

 After closing the sale of our house, my mother and I started searching through all sorts of real estate online and with multiple realty apps. We weren't making much headway after nearly a month and I ended up requesting assistance from a company that seemed to deliver better results yet still wasn't providing what I needed. A representative got back to me very quickly and I was assigned and agent who spoke with me the next day. The difference between this agent and the agent who sold my house was like night and day. my new agent was friendly, helpful communicative, patient, didn't fault us, didn't put us down, didn't lie to us, didn't pretend to be my mother with contacting other people, and wasn't abrasive. I wish I had someone like her as my first agent.

While my agent did regularly check for possible homes, my mother and I each made efforts to pour through the search multiple times a day. We learned that real estate moves slowly during holiday weekends, that patience is critical, that losing a bid on a home doesn't mean that we won't get one, that this is more like an ugly auction head game and nothing like a supermarket (first come, first serve), and while we were pretty certain, we firmly realized we hope to never go through this again. I must have completed ten virtual tours easily, if not more. All too often something was revealed duri8ng the virtual tours that had not been made obvious when reading about the homes and viewing the photos and/or using the 3d walkthroughs. Often steps weren't fully revealed, doorways weren't featured well, the beginnings and endings of flights of stairs... Things I had to know about because my mother is in a wheelchair and cannot merely use stairs or squeeze through any doorway. Event to accommodate a dwelling, I would need to know that there is sufficient space available to adapt certain areas for handicapped living.

I had to stay within a fixed price for purchasing a house in order to match a safety budget for my mother since an amount from the sale of you previous home was to replenish my mother's retirement. Even searching out in the middle of nowhere was providing us with some discouraging results: some places were ugly. some were cramped, some were overpriced for their size... It felt like for each possible house I found interesting, I found at lease five others that immediately didn't suit our needs. This was a very frustrating part of the search. Another frustrating aspect was trying to keep everything sorted in my head because it was all starting to blend together; sometimes I had to compare houses on like for several minutes to ensure I was considering the right place. 

Finally we found something we liked that even the agent volunteered to say that it was one of the best places we had looked at. The pictures looked decent, the data was good, most of everything was already good enough for handicapped living and featured some options we liked as well. The e-tour went well. The agent took some measurements for me so that I knew which passages needed alteration and which could not be adjusted so we could determine whether to go with this or not. We bit the bullet and decided to bid on the house with the realtor's recommendations. Someone else was the higher bidder, but we waived so many options and inspections, it made out bid more appealing to the seller. We won the bid and closed the transaction in June 2021. Unfortunately, we did have to wait on the seller vacating the premises can that has cost us more money and time as well as waiting to make other preparations. Now comes the process of setting up various utilities and a plethora of of things to- some of which will be done right away while others with take time...

we finally managed to sell the house...

 In December 2020, the contractor we hired to restore the house abandoned work on the house. They refused to return calls be anybody regarding the house. They would not respond to texts. The would not respond to emails. The county was tallying up violations again and the contractor was guilty of every single one of them but because the property was ours, we were getting extremely negative attention from the county and neighborhood. Even our closest neighbors had become less friendly over time. We were arriving at a point where we knew we did not want to live in that house anymore; there were just way too many mixed memories, especially negative ones. It was more than practical reasoning that led us to choose to now want to live there or even in that city anymore. We wanted to cut all ties. So much had already changed in the decades that we had lived in that region and it wasn't a change for the better.

We were considering moving back to the city where we were currently rooming. We had lived here before for nine years and even though this place had changed it was still familiar enough that we felt confident that we could make a life out here again. Unfortunately, real estate had inflated considerably since when we first came to this town, but we figured it was still manageable. What we didn't know what that it was still steadily increasing with time and this was going to pose a problem.

In February 2021, we gave up on the contractor. it was obvious that things had reached their absolute worst possible status and would never improve. Unfortunately, we did not have the finances to take them to court, plus the lawyers we consulted all pretty much said the same thing- we might win but won't get much out of it and it could take months or years to win. plus, were told that all these lawyers were expensive and we couldn't currently afford their fees, which naturally left us feeling hopeless.

So we got in touch with a different realtor we had contacted in the beginning who turned out to be a real pain in the butt. She remembered being in touch with us previously, but she seemed to think we turned her services down when all we had asked her was if her company could recommend a contractor or other service providers in regards to what needed to be done with the house. She blew us off and eventually said she did not (which turned out to be a lie) and we resumed looking for our search for service providers. We were nowhere near ready to sell at the time, but apparently she held a grudge about something that didn't happen. This time we asked for her recommendations again and opted to go with her services after saying she know a contractor that her company has been using for years...

The realtor went through the house and sent videos showing its current condition. it was gravely disappointing. The first contractor we hired didn't restore the house- they attempted to remodel it contrary to our constant refusals. They did many things contrary to contract. They ignored corrected errors on the contract. They used substandard materials. It was asserted that they had used materials that had been previously installed and used. Areas that had been completed were not weatherproofed and more leaks happened and mildew once again grew in a portion of the basement and had to again be remediated and parts had to be replaced. They lied about completion of portions of the house and correcting errors. A lot of their installation was substandard and had to be redone more than once. the list goes on and it really is upsetting to think a company would take advantage of a handicapped senior female so grossly. Even when I tried to assist on my mother's behalf, I didn't usually get useful results and they would lie to me as well. They have been caught on so many lies by me, my mother, and various other people. As such, it was best to move on with getting the house complete asap and used the contractor associated with the realtor, who turned out to be great but also more expensive than originally planned because of correcting other faults either ignored and worsened or created directly by the first contractor. 

We were running out of money and we had to get the house sold fast, which the second contractor was able to accomplish. The realtor took care of the rest of the process, but didn't handle it well- we lost the first bidder to a second bidder offering only slightly more than the current top bid. The second bidder waived inspections and then had them done anyway and she and her realtor played shenanigans with my realtor, which in turn caused us to lose money on the deal, far less that the initial offer. The realtor didn't know how to play hardball with these people and the best she could do was threaten them with breach of contract if they continued behaving as they implied. finally an agreement was resolved, but we lost over 130k on the final deal which was closed at the end of April this year, which crushed my mother's spirits incredibly. We were counting on that high bid so much and then to lose such a chunk of it really knocked the wind out of us. This is because we wanted to replenish my mother's retirement, plus gets a nice home that was affordable- however we came to realize real estate prices were about 200k more in the city where we were currently staying than shortly after the house had flooded. because of this we had to start searching other cities further out, which affects our current grocery and prescription delivery services...

and so our home flooded and we lost virtually everything...

 After a winter blizzard and a delayed thaw, my mother and I managed to get out to the house again- this time just to pick up mail and any packages. It was March 26, 2018, two days before my birthday and there were no major plans for working on the house that day. Unfortunately, this was a day that indescribable unhappiness permeated multiple aspect of my life. I had trouble getting inside and when I did, things already didn't seem right: the lights weren't on anywhere including the front porch, things smelled peculiar, the mail at the door step was soggy, the carpeted stairs were moldy in a couple spots, and then I realized that 90% of the ceiling was no longer were it should be; it was broken and soggy on the floor and I was walking on it. Furthermore, I hear a strange sound and as I carefully stepped down the hallway, I saw into the living room and water was gushing out of the ceiling at full pressure; we had a disastrous leak...

 The first thing we did was get the water turned off. Then we called a couple relatives and financial advisor to let them know what happened and get some advice. Neither my mother nor I have ever experienced anything like this and we were not prepared for it in any sense of the word. We first went with a personal recommendation that turned out to be a nightmare. The woman we hire abandoned the job and we discovered things were missing. Next, we got some price quotes for mod/mildew remediation and salvage. These guys finished the job but they were a franchise and some of their work turned out to be questionable in terms of how things were cleaned, packaged, and items requested to be saved were missing. Furthermore, they did not dispose of the washer and dryer units are originally requested and claimed we did not request it, but would be happy to do so for an extra fee to which we turned them down. Then we needed quotes from contractors for putting the insides of the house back the way it was because the remediation team gutted the entire house from top to bottom. We checked with a couple of home improvement-type apps and contacted recommended companies not realized they actually are at the top of the list because they paid to be there rather than being their based on performance and customer reviews. this led to a nearly 6.5 year long nightmare with a company that we hope to put out of business and collect maximum damages due to extended and multiple incidents of unprofessional and unethical behavior.

We have lost so much or what was originally and allegedly salvaged I can't say who is to blame for missing things because there were things that did not need to be thrown out that we specifically asked to have salvaged. It could have been the first woman hired or part of her crew, the remediation team, the contractor, neighbors, passers by, or some combination of the previously mentioned. I also had a former acquaintance offer to help, but he had his own agenda and refused to do things the was we ask, which namely was not to sell the house as is and lose money. We already have lost so much money in this process, due to unethical business practices, liquidating my mother's retirement to afford these expenses, and so on. We can't afford to replace everything we lost. Some things can't be replaced either due to cost, item age, limited availability, heirloom, handmade, etc. My grandfather built the house in '68 and it has stayed in our family ever since. loosing and everything inside was devastating and definitely not the way we wanted to part ways with that home, if ever...

my mother's decine in health and decisive moment of immobility...

 Prior to 2015, my mother had been seeking various treatments for a plethora of maladies. She was trying to control her diabetes with the help of a certain medical organization who essentially promised she could eventually be in control without the use of medicine or insulin. This was supposed to be accomplished through extreme dieting and deprivation, supplements, and various other methods. The only useful thing to come of the experience was learning that she had Celiac disease & she had several allergies she had never been aware about. The worst experience at this time was the radio frequency treatments which consisted of rod-like needles that were inserted into her body and discharged what felt like low to moderate doses of electricity. This accomplished nothing beneficial whatsoever and instead was quite detrimental to her health. It caused great pain, swelling, and discoloration. It caused bruising. It caused painful sciatica episodes that left her tearful wailing. Every time she stood, she would experience severe lightheadedness and dizziness that would cause her to pass out. Prior to falling, her face would distort and she would become unresponsive and then gravity would just take over. Witnessing this was so scary; I didn't understand what was going on. With time she needed a constant guide to stay stable when walking sort distances and couldn't stand for long periods of time or she would pass out and fall. 

One day in September 2015, my mother wanted to have a shower and I guided her as usual, but as she stood bracing herself at the sink while I positioned her shower chair, she passed out and fell straight down on top of her legs and ankles. I had my back turned for literally less than five seconds and there wasn't any warning, but down she went with barely any sound. when I pulled her off her legs, I saw her foot had dislocated at a right angle and part of her leg bone was stretching the skin from inside. She regained consciousness very quickly and said her leg was broken. Indeed, she had three very bad breaks in addition to the dislocation. It took six hours to get her out of the basement, up the stairs, and out of the house. she crawled up the stairs on her knees on her own because the people I called for help and I couldn't get her up all the way. She also had to get in the car to go to the ER mostly on her own, too. Unfortunately, the person who I called for help and his son just weren't capable and I felt bad that I couldn't do it on my own.

My mother ended up spending two weeks in the ER. The first night, the doctors put her to sleep and relocated her ankle joint which took less than 5 minutes. The second night, the doctors performed surgery on her ankle. Twelve screws and two plates were permanently. The third night, she had a heart attack from a blood clot that resulted from the previous night's surgery. The hospital staff was minimally responsive, telling her to relax- that it was only indigestion. By some miracle, she survived the heart attack, but as a result she was kept even longer for tests and observation. I had to rely on her incompetent acquaintance for transportation to the hospital and watch our special needs service pet while I would briefly visit her once each day for less than 15 minutes or he would complain bitterly about how much longer must her suffer- ironic considering he always saw her at least once a day, saw her before I did, and saw her for longer than I did. This... from a guy who left my mother after proposing to her.

When she was released from the hospital, my mother was told she would owe over $55,000. She was told they would help her with signing up for medicare or medicaid, but then changed their minds midway through the process. My great uncle visited from out of state to see if he could speak to hospital staff in a professional capacity regarding my mothers bill because as a reverend who works with people who live with challenging circumstances. the hospital was not only unwilling to listen after agreeing to a meeting but they were rude with him as well, which I thought was absolutely appalling to treat a man of the cloth poorly. So no agreements were negotiated to any extent even though they reneged with their offer to assist with starting my mother with retroactive coverage, even though their surgery caused her to have a blood clot which they said they could avoid, and even though they almost caused my mother's death through negligent reaction to her heart attack.

Upon my mother's release from the hospital, she was restricted to temporary wheelchair mobility and virtually round the clock bed rest. Our home was no longer conducive to her resuming living with me on the basement level so it needed some major renovations to the main floor to make it possible for her to live there instead so we found a hotel about 35 miles away that was affordable without getting ridiculously far away, however with all my other chores and having unreliable transportation to get anything done, getting out to the house occurred infrequently. There was so much to do and I was the only one doing it so it became stressful primarily because of the guy providing the unreliable transportation. Again, it was my mother's ex and he frequently made life difficult for both of us. he owed my mother a lot of money which he never paid back, he talked about being with her but didn't want to be there to be with her, he inserted himself at times when my mother an I were going to celebrate times alone as a family and if I complained he would have a snit about it. When my mother no longer required the cast or braces and completed her physical therapy she took care of my transportation needs since I wasn't driving after two back surgeries and a series of scratched corneas. This did allow me to get to the house more often but there were still occasional obstacles...

why i disappear from posting regularly on here...

 I believe I have covered this before in past blogs: things happen, motivation, depression, lack of having something to say I find valid enough to post about, waiting for closure on something before I post, forgetting to post, and so on. For me, it's usually a combination of two or more of these things that inevitably lead me to withdraw and shutdown emotionally and subsequently cease my usual activities. Such is never truer than in the past several years due to sequence of related and unrelated events. I will reveal these events in the following posts...

back-words... poem...

I submitted this poem for a game called Mabinogi on 1/15/14. Unfortunately I did not win the contest, but I enjoyed creating this piece.

 

in-game name: Kusachiho

server: Alexina

Mabinogi Winter Merriment

A trusty dog and sled is all I need

to coast icescapes, making monsters bleed.

Choice of weapon matters not,

In every way, I'll slaughter the entire lot.

Even bare-handed, I will tear

through every last bear.

In the end, I'll marvel with glee

that I leveled exponentially.

After the threat has been eliminated,

I'll note that I hardly hesitated

and setup a campfire to cook,

thinking, "Eat your heart out, Nanook."