The Family Girl #098: Rambling About Dad
      - Bobbie Cabot

I've taken a few days to get back. Things are not yet right for me after my dad died. I think I will never be right. This is my first time to lose family. I don't know if things will ever be like it was again, but Mo said something: why did I expect it to, because it can't - the key is to learn to accept it, and move on. That's not easy, of course. But, nevertheless, one has to. I'm afraid I'm not as strong as others who are able to do that, but, as Mo said, I don't have to do it alone. For now, it's about putting some distance, and living with it. And also taking joy from our time with our dad. That may take doing since all I can feel at the moment is the loss. Anyway. This blog is about my dad, and the people I love.

One - About My Dad

My dad was a six-eight blond, blue-eyed Canadian born in Quebec in 1956, and became a naturalized American citizen later at age 15 and settled in with an uncle in Pennsylvania. At age 18, he graduated from high school and became an office clerk and assistant at his uncle's company (my dad wasn't rich, so he postponed his plans for college for a while). Two years later, he met my mother, and the following year, they got married. Two years after that, they had my sister, Adele, and because of her, my folks thought more seriously of the future. My dad, with the family's encouragement, enrolled in military school, and got a degree in political science. A year into military school, I was born. Because of me (or so Dad says) he was motivated to do well. He got pretty good grades, and continued on to get his masters, guaranteeing a rank of 2nd Lieutanant upon his graduation in 1986.

During his tenure as a 1st Lieutenant, he acted as the adjutant of his commanding officer (an adjutant usually has the rank of captain, but because his general wanted an academy-trained officer, he kept the position vacant and appointed my dad in an acting capacity). During that time, dad was assigned and deployed with our forces to the Gulf War. He made it through, and returned as a full Captain. Later, in 1996 and again 1997, he was deployed twice during the Afghan war. Dad had a bit of a rough time "landing" during his return, but he recovered, and came back to us, stronger and intact. He was promoted to Lt. Colonel in 1999 and was fast-promoted to full Colonel the following year so he could be appointed as part of the army's advisory personnel for the new advisory board for the new Homeland Security agency (he was nominated, he supposed, on the strength of his volunteering as part of the East Coast military volunteer teams to assist in the recovery at Ground Zero).

After that assignment, he was appointed as the commanding officer for one of the East Coast military camps that specialized in training and logistics, and that was where he completed his military career, retiring in 2007 as Major General (this last promotion was during his retirement month, so he assumed it was one of those military promotions to round out the army's quotas, so he didn't really think of himself as a major general).

Two - Passing Away

My dad passed away at the age of 71. He was in town getting Philippine and Japanese visas for him, ma, Adele and Marvin. It was their intention to spend December with us, and spend the following months or so to roam the country a little bit. With the recent typhoons, they might have changed their plans, but at the time, the country wasn't doing bad. Mo and I were convincing them to change it to sometime in March, April or May: sure, it'll be crazy because most people would be travelling during these "summer" months, but the weather should be lots better.

Americans need not bother with Philippine visas, as visas aren't required if they're only visiting for about a month, but dad, being dad, didn't want to have to hurry around because of an about-to-expire visa. What was amazing was that they were able to convice Adele to join them.

Getting Japanese visas were a little hard at the moment, though, so dad decided to work on their Philippine ones first.

Anyway, he was working on their visas. He was a block or so from the Philippine embassy, having "accomplished the heck out of his mission" (that's a standard witticism of his). Dad saw a car barreling down the street despite the red light, and there was a family of 3 kids and a mom crossing the street. He reached out to pull them back to the curb, but dad got hit with a glancing blow from the car (the family was okay). But it was bad. He passed away at the hospital.

Mo and I felt so guilty - he was working on visas to visit us after all - but Ma and Adele convinced us that we weren't at fault. Ma actually slapped me (that was one of the few times she did), and said to stop talking nonsense, that Mo and I weren't to blame. If there was any blame, it was because he loved too much.

I won't dwell on Dad's funeral, except to say that he was laid to rest in Arlington with full honors.

Dad was nothing short of a Hero. And I love him.

Three - My Ma, Pensions and Rent

Like me, my ma is five-foot-one. She's an Italian brunette from Palermo, Italy. She's fluent in English and her first language, Italian. She was totally devoted to my dad, and with his passing, we were all worried about her: ma wants to keep the house, and that meant she'd be living on her own. But we and the cousins had a plan: one of my close cousins on my ma's side will be living with her - she's a nurse and works on the night shift in a large hospital fairly close by.

Another cousin who's studying in GW, my alma matter, and works part time in a convenience store of one of the big chains near the campus, will also live with her. He drives, so that means he can drive for my ma if needed. Needless to say, the two are excited to have a Chevy Chase address. Of course, both were willing to pay rent, but they weren't really rolling in dough...

When my dad retired, he got a pension that was roughly 60% of his military pay, plus full medical for him and ma. And when he passed away, ma got about 60% equivalent of that, plus full medical as well. That means, ma will get a reasonable pension of about $5,600 monthly - more than enough for her needs, I think, yet Amalia and Geoff were willing to pay rent, like $1,000 a month - pretty reasonable for Chevy Chase - so that means Ma will be able to have enough, and, in exchange for the rent, Amie and Geoff will get a Chevy Chase address, live in my and Adele's fairly large rooms, have their clothes washed and etc, and they'll be enjoying my ma's legendary cooking. All they needed to do was to help clean up a bit, help maintain the house, and to help ma clean up my house in Bethesda during the twice-a-month visits that my folks do (or did) for me. Ma was very okay with all of this, as she was pretty close with my cousin Amalie and her folks, and was very comfortable with Geoff. And I know that we could trust them - Adele and I knew we could truse Amie and Geoff - we've known them since we were kids. So we knew Ma was in good hands. Amie works the night shift at the hospital so that means Ma will have Amie with her during the day, and Geoff will be with her at night. (We didn't let Ma know that Mo, Adele, Marvin and I were subsidizing our cousins - to the tune of $500 a month for Mo and I, and $200 for Marvin and Adele, which means my cousins will both actually just be paying $650 a month - Amie, and Geoff & his folks, aren't rich. Even so, apartments in DC go for about $2,000-2,500 a month - DC apartment rent is like about 50% higher than the national average, and Chevy Chase is even higher. So for $650 a month, with utilities, laundry and food included, it's more than reasonable.

Some of the other cousins were a little jealous of Amie and Geoff, but no one else volunteered. Plus we didn't trust them enough with my ma. So tough.

Four - Mo Thinks She's a Celebrity

Mo is short for Momoko. and she is my spouse, fully fluent in Japanese, English, and (now) Filipino. No language barrier between us at all. I would say "wife" but since we were bothe female, and there are some connotations associated with terms like "husband" and "wife," we prefer "spouse."

We met when I was working for an IT consultancy firm more than fifteen years ago: I was a business process analyst/manager, and she was a part time graphics design specialist. The circumstances about how we met is covered, somewhat, by my old blogs, "Family Girl" and "Working Girl," here in BCTS, and you can read them if you're really curious.

She didn't really need to work - her family was fairly well off: her father is a ward officer for one of the big, national political parties while her mother owns and runs a large retail department store there. And Mo's mother gets to own and run it despite being a daughter because she actually built the company. But Mo is realist enough that the one who will end up running it will be his little brother, Toshio, instead of her. What can you do - Japanese customs and traditions, you know...

Anyway, Mo has a trust fund, and she's plenty smart, so she doesn't need to do that. In fact, her working in the US was part of that - a declaration that she is independent, and can live beyond the shadow of her family, and her country's customs (without eschewing it).

Mo looks a lot like this early 2000s J-Pop singer, Mai Kuraki. Mai Kuraki is a very pretty girl. My relatives seem to have a thing for J-Pop and K-Pop stars, so they were all pretty smitten with my spouse. I can't really blame them, since I was, too. And though she was pretty fluent, she couldn't completely remove the accent, and my cousins, especially the guys, found that pretty cute and attractive. I tried not to let it bother me. Mo said it all made her feel like some kind of celebrity. When we came over for dad's funeral, Mo didn't expect this. She actually started to believe that maybe she could sing, too. I asked if she remembered that one time she tried singing, and I recorded it. She didn't speak to me for the rest of that day.

Ma and Adele made an effort to get to know her more - clearly, they though her pretty nice and interesting, and they felt guilty for only making the effort now. Mo was moved to tears by that, and toward the end of our stay, Mo said she liked my mother and sister very much. So I gave her a big kiss.

Five - Gia is a Big Ham

Mo and I have an eight-year-old daughter - Aiko Gianina - the first name was from my ma's family, and the second from Mo's mom's family. Gia is actually our second child - Mo miscarried with our first one (we gave our first one the same name even though we didn't get to meet her. In that way, I guess that makes Gia like a Junior. lol). She was from my sperm and from Mo's eggs (prior to transitioning, I had saved some sperm, on the off-chance I might want to have a baby later). Gia was our second try.

Again, if you are curious about it, check out my old blogs.

Anyway, we've visited the States twice before with Gia, but this was the first time that we stayed long enough for the family to meet her. And the family got to know Gia (and Mo) a little bit and she them. In fact, she was very popular among her little cousins, and the adults doted on her, especially Ma.

We raised Gia to be friendly and kind, and she takes after her japanese mom and her canadian-american grandpa a lot: she is quite the cute kid, if I do say so - she looks like Lily from Modern Family (with, maybe a touch of Marisa Tomei), and she kept all my little nephews and nieces distracted. There was also no language barrier because she was fluent in English (as well as in Japanese and Filipino). When we were at the house after the service, there were gangs of kids in the back ranging back and forth, playing a complicated game only they knew, and in the lead, tiny Gia. It made me feel nice. When the day was done, Gia had collected dozens of email, instagram, snapchat, tumbler and facebook names/addresses. I also promised to make up a Discord server for her and her new friends when we get back home. Gia declared to her cousins, though, that she doesn't use Twitter, but nowadays, no kids use Twitter anymore. I mean X. It's a little too political and toxic now, especially with Elon Musk running it.

Six - What's Next

I miss my dad. Such an inadequate sentence. But that's the long and short of it. With his passing, it's made me think of life and family. And it's made me think of moving back home, to take care of ma. But what do I really have there anymore, except for ma. My home now is here. With work and friends here, and a life I've gotten to know and love. And I don't know if the girls will even consent to wanting to go live in the States. But who will take care of Ma?

I thought about Mo, and if she has the same thoughts, too. Would she want us to live in Kyoto? It's a different culture and life. But Mo and I were able to thrive here - a culture that was so different compared to Kyoto and DC. If she asks, I can only say I'd consider it, and then I'd try. I owed her that at least. Our moving here was all because of me. And she moved here. Because of me. I love her too much not to consider it. Besides, her entire family's there - a complete support sturcture. We'd be okay.

I guess my worry was my ma - who'd take care of her; our situation - Japanese culture wasn't so accepting of people like me, and families like ours; my career - I have enough put away that I don't think we'd miss my job and salary, and we wouldn't need to rely on mama-san's support, but I don't know what I'd do there, and if I can be a productive person there.

It will take lots of talking, both with Mo and Gia. I wasn't too worried much with Gia - she'd go with her moms wherever, but we need to talk with her about it nevertheless.

But in any case, in the short term, I guess we'd need to wait for next year, and ma's visit, because she's said that she wants to see Manila and Kyoto, like she and my dad originally planned to. And I'm sure we'd also need include Adele and Marvin in our plans. Maybe we can sublet the house beside ours for a couple of months or something while they were here, or if Adele and Marvin can manage a somewhat small bedroom, we can accommodate them all in the house.

Mo also said as much about making similar preparations back in Kyoto. Which means I'll have to chat with mama-san, papa-san and Toshio. That's not a problem, but I absolutely dread having to deal with Tosh...

Another issue - Gia wants to have a dog. Having met Adele's and Marvin's family pooch, a bright and handsome two-year old shepherd named Roper, I guess it's only natural. Anyway, we have to think about it.

Seven - Apologies

I'm sorry for this ramble. I wanted to talk about my family and my dad, but to put a little distance so I wouldn't break down. I know you know I'm like this - putting a little distance helps me to go on. Thank you for allowing me to ramble.

- Bobbie

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