teatoohottohandle

[teatoohottohandle]

March love letter

How do I stay committed to loving deeply?

I used to hold grudges like I was on my death bed begging for more years of life. Because I grew up with a family that urged me to just get over stuff right away, I never knew what it was like to sit with my feelings until I went to therapy. And even then, I felt like I had to justify everything. I had to come up with reasons for why I had strong feelings or felt anything at all because of how invalidated I felt growing up with all of my big feelings.

Sometimes when I find myself feeling resentful or feeling that heavy coat of irate misunderstanding, I start to stew in it. I go back and forth between justification:

"this person is a shitty person because of x,y,z"

to

"I shouldn't feel this way. Maybe I'm the awful person because I'm being so hateful and negative right now."

I feel the way I feel. There's not much I can do or change about it, but accept that that's how I feel and accept that it's subjective and that doesn't mean the person is bad or evil or deserves any of my negative harboring towards them (lol). Nothing about my feelings are objectively fair, good, or moral. And I can't expect that people knowing how I feel will change anything.

What I can expect is acceptance on my end. I can also expect change. How do I stay committed to loving deeply?

It is understanding that I can change. My feelings can remain the same and I can accept the situation and navigate with confidence even if it is not with ease. I can accept that right now, things are not what I want them to be, but I know it will get better and it will improve. With dedication to myself and my love, I can stay committed.

[teatoohottohandle]

February love letter

Love used to be a feeling where I dropped and fell into a vat of it. Sticky, consuming, and obsessive.

But love with my current partner is like an expansion from my core to the rest of my body. A warm energy spreads throughout and I feel safe, grounded, expansive. Like the growth of the sun over a day. The spread of the rain from one end of town to the other. A blanket getting pulled up to your chin, arms tucked underneath. Socks getting rolled up to your shins (lol). That is how my current love feels for this person and because I now know what that feels like, I can practice it with others. It's a warm orbit in me, something that expands and grows, and contracts and fundamentally understands change.

I never knew this is what it could be.

Because it's so healing, I am feeling even more bold and confident. I feel like I can really establish roots and connections with others in ways I have not been able to because I've been so guarded and almost so obsessed with finding myself in that sticky vat of insecure love. Love that was so consumptive and consuming, it felt like I just wanted to be doused in it all the time and if I wasn't, then it would have been something I never could get enough of.

I am in something so radically beautiful.

[teatoohottohandle]

When I need a reminder:

You have come a long way.

Trigger warning: child sexual assault

Remember Ashley? She was your best friend from first grade. That day you went to school so sick, still feverish, and still had lunch, but the lunch was so gross and sat in your stomach and when you ran outside for recess, it just projectile vomited into the sandpit after sprinting with Ashley? You then buried it and told her,

"Don't tell anyone."

Remember Ashley? Your best friend from first grade who objectified you, sexualized you, and made you feel like you were dirt?

Your family told you not to hang out with her. But you still did. And it hurt you. She hurt you because all you wanted to do was provide her the unique and authentic love of best friends and all she could do was take it for granted.

Fast forward to middle school where you're skipping 7th grade with your BFF Orlando. He told you no, he helped reorient you, and he encouraged you to skip a grade with him. He said people were weirdos, he pointed out when people were being weird, but he like any other middle schooler, wanted to be in with the cool gang. When he got there, he brought you up, but then you found yourself too awkward to really successfully blend in and found yourself succumbing to doing stuff, hanging out with people who wanted a fake version of you, not the real you. You were caught.

High school your relationship with the cool kids dissipated because it was new grounds. Anyone could be anyone but also cool kids meant nothing. Everybody had their own friend cliques and instead of staying with friends who accepted you, you gravitated to a group of A-Z-N boiz who would wreck your self worth and esteem and make you believe you were a bitch for years and years and years. You wouldn't recover until junior year of college and even then the terror of misogyny sometimes scares you awake.

In college you felt ostracized and weird and singled out. You weren't the positive girl boss the 2010s called for and you still couldn't mask, blend, or code switch into being the popular, nice girl. As a matter of fact, you start to really wonder about gender but that's not really until much, much later that you're able to own your nonbinary / gender fluidity / gender queer self.

You want to be someone you're not until you finally realize you're the person you were always meant to be.

When you meet JDC, you are absolutely smitten. You're over dating the moment you meet the love of your life because he is the love of your life. He wraps you up and neatly sets you down, carries you in a soft and warm bag, makes sure you're comfortable before you spread out and fly. Before you're able to wrap people and bundle them, and carry them for part of the journey until they're ready.

Your love has healed you. Then you adopt Chaco and Iago. And they bring out the best in you, the best that you never thought could have happened but it does because of how much you find yourself loving everyday.

That love is like a flashlight on a wall - headlights in the woods - nightlight in the hallway -- it spreads everywhere and it's just enough, it's just light enough that you see a part of you that you kept dormant for so long to protect yourself.

You have come a long way.

[teatoohottohandle]

I almost crashed out because I'm having a hard time dealing with incompetent people in positions of power at work.

[teatoohottohandle]

Manifestations

I am working at my dream job

Everyday I find joy and positivity

Iago and Chaco are happy and living their best lives

My love and I respect each other and we love each other endlessly

I am spending quality time with my loved ones

I have so much savings and I am beyond comfort financially

[teatoohottohandle]

My father is dying

My father was diagnosed with heart failure in 2015. He had a stroke in 2005, and another in 2015. He also was diagnosed with chronic kidney disease in 2015.

I know, as a Buddhist, as a person with logic, as a person in general, that everybody dies. Death is a cycle of life.

But I don't think I am ready to be someone who has lost their dad.

In 2024, my dad was starting to feel light-headed and like he was going to faint. His breathing was irregular. He had finally gotten on top of exercising, his medications, his cardiac defibrillator. His diet was better, not the best, but he had stopped drinking coffee and alcohol and soda so much. He was doing better and yet he was fading at times.

They found a leak in his left heart wall. A tiny leak because as the doctor explained to me, he has heart failure. I think it was the first time I heard "Your father has heart failure" as in my dad's heart is no longer working as well as it once was. And there is no recovery. There is no remission. There is no getting better. There is only getting worse as his heart is no longer able to pump blood as efficiently as it could.

This was September/October 2024. I dropped my dad off for his mitral clip surgery where they would insert a clip in the left ventricular wall to mend the hole. It would be a small insertion in his groin and they would take a tube from the groin to his heart. It would also require a small poke through his heart wall, which is actually very common in people. For the most part, a good majority of us do live with a hole in our hearts. When the surgery was done, the doctor called me and told me it went well. It was a 4 hour surgery and my dad is waking up. I can pick him up and take him home tomorrow but he'll still be experiencing shortness of breath, tiredness, and fatigue but he'll be starting medication therapy where a nurse will give him regular calls and ask how he's doing to see if they need to adjust his medications.

I don't know what came over me, but I asked what his life would look like now. And the doctor was straightforward:

About 50 percent of patients who have heart failure will be around in 5 years.

I think about that statistic everyday now. I'm 28 and I have been thinking this past week about how my dad may not live to see me turn 30, to see me make more important life decisions about potentially getting married, starting a family. He may not live long enough to see my brother graduate from medical school. He may not live long enough to experience the joys of being a grandparent.

In 5 years, I may not have a dad.

I may have to tell people that my dad is gone. And I'm not ready for that. I'm not ready to accept that my dad is dying.

My father and I have always had a rocky relationship. When I was young, he used to work the third shift meaning he'd leave for work around 3-4pm and come back around midnight. Before he left for work, my brother and I would run into his arms and hug him goodbye.

But my dad had anger issues. He wouldn't be happy to hear us yelling, jumping on our beds, laughing in the mornings. He wanted to sleep after work and in the morning. He would wake up and beat the walls and tell us to be quiet. I was terrified of making him angry. Cowering in fear, we grew apart. My brother and I got older, too old to jump into my dad's arms and tell him bye.

In 2010, my dad was laid off and was unemployed for two years. I began to resent him because my mom picked up the slack. She did everything for us. She cooked, cleaned, bought new clothes for us, shuttled us from home to school to Chinese School to lion dance practice, to aunt and uncle's house, back home. She managed our schedules with our aunts and uncles to pick us up and made sure we were safe. Meanwhile my dad would spend all day watching movies, playing Solitaire, and then we had to help our dad apply for unemployment and for jobs on top of our schoolwork. It was a hard time and my resentment kept growing until suddenly, I just felt sick looking at him. I felt disappointed he was my dad. I felt disappointed he was my mom's partner, the dad to my mom's kids.

From there, we hardly spoke. And I took my mom's side.

I moved away in 2019 and then moved back in 2021 during the COVID pandemic. In 2021, I saw my dad cutting cucumbers on the kitchen counter -- no cutting board -- and I asked him why he was doing that on the counter and he immediately flew into a rage. He slammed his hands on the counters and pointed the knife at me. Sometimes I remember what he said, today I don't. I took the dogs and left. We walked to the park, I was crying the entire time. I've never had a knife pointed at me.

Since 2021, my dad has been in and out of the hospital. I didn't speak to him or look him in the eyes until he went to the emergency room in 2023. He drove himself because he felt like he couldn't breathe. They readjusted his heart meds, gave him new ones to take. In 2024, the complicated breathing increased along with feeling light-headed and like at any moment, he might faint.

It's in 2024 that I choose to let go and move forward with my dad. And it was a week ago that I decided no matter what, no matter how he has treated all of us and my mom, I can still help give him the best last years of his life.

Maybe it's a form of grieving and mourning, but when my mom's dad died, she cried happy tears.

We gave him the best life he could have ever had

is what her and my aunts and uncles keep telling me over the years. They all loved my grandpa, flaws and all, despite everything he didn't do and did do, throughout their lives, they have asked for forgiveness from him for the ways they disappointed him even if they were disappointed by him. I could never witness or experience that tenderness until these past couple of weeks. I felt like a loose string allowing myself to billow out and to let my feelings come and go, come and acknowledge, go and heal.

Dad, you will never read this. But I want you to know that a lot of people have tried to make this the best life you could have ever had.

[teatoohottohandle]

I took a risk and was honest and vulnerable. Thank you universe for responding.

[teatoohottohandle]

A love letter in December 2024

This year was emotionally tumultuous. I felt a creeping, stalking numbness attempt to and at times, successfully enter my body and force me out - an out of body experience truly.

When I think back to those times, it was mostly the spring and summer before I left UltraViolet. Those last moments were times when I attempted to logic my way out of my feelings and emotions - tried to reason that I "was being too emotional" and I had to think about my house, my car, my payments, my bills, the boys. I don't have anyone to help me financially anymore because truthfully I still owe my sister $4k and my mom $4k. Both of which are due to house projects. I tried to reason my way out of panic.

I should have let it settle in. I should have let my panic happen. Even though I'm always going to be at peace with leaving UltraViolet, I'm not sure if I left at the right time. I always knew I was gonna leave, it was just a matter of when.

It's led me down to a path where I'm questioning my worth and who I am meant to be. I'm not meant to be a cog in a capitalist machine or capitalism in general. But I do want to make a positive impact. One that is long lasting. Sometimes, I think about how I could have changed and transformed - especially when I'm teaching these dual enrollment classes. Teaching puts you in a position where you should constantly evaluate your power and control over students. How will you anchor that positioning of power, if at all? Teaching is a grounding job that i wouldn't mind doing. But does it mean that I would be "meant to" teach?

Sometimes I feel like I'm wrapped up in the journey of destiny vs appreciating that right now, things are far from perfect, and maybe that is exactly how it was supposed to be. When I was younger, I used to dream about when things felt right all the time and question when I would finally be at the place I'm supposed to be. Nowadays, I question if the decisions I'm making make sense and furthermore, if I got the $$$ to make such dumb decisions anymore.

When I was younger, I used to think those big purchases were when you'd be close to attaining something, but now, big purchases like a mortgage and a car are just bites in your ass. It ignites you to reconsider what adulthood means and looks like in a capitalistic society.

Teaching my ethnic studies course and my AAPI Cultures class, we talk about what's "normal" and what's not. Normal to them is being heterosexual, straight, cis, and growing up or raising a 2-parent household. You're being raised in a house. Your family owns a car. Family gatherings have some arguments, but generally everybody gets along as long as you say sorry.

All of this is encompassed in the American Dream. We've normalized the American Dream because we operate in a capitalist society that demand more = good and good = better and better doesn't exist for people of color, queer and trans communities, and disabled communities. Better simply is unachievable even if we have the house, the car, the clothes, the purses, the wallets, the shoes.

And our relationships are about length and not about navigating conflict well or communicating well in a capitalist society.

I watched a TikTok recently from Isaiah Frizzelle (sorry it's the Instagram link) who talked about how rare friendship is. It's not that our friendships are falling apart and that we have falling out, it's more so that the friendship was never there to begin with because not a lot of people know how to be good friends. It was motivating for me as I begin to reflect on the year and who I want to be for everybody I appreciate, respect, and want to be in community with.

For me, next year I want to be a better friend. I want to be someone who's not just appreciative of proximity and convenience, but fully and wholly express gratitude for who the person is. I want to be a good friend. I want to grow with my friends.

I'll keep in mind that conflict is good even though it feels awful to be embroiled in conflict / in the middle of it. I know that I can navigate conflict well. It's just a matter of trusting myself and others in the process that we'll move through the conflict. It won't be easy. But it will help my relationships grow stronger and that's what I seek -- growth, strength, resilience.

My communication needs to be better. I need to learn how to ask for help and be okay with being vulnerable. My pride gets in the way. My ego gets in the way.

To my December 2024 self, I love you and I love the growth you've done. Let's continue to unwind

[teatoohottohandle]

I know what my mother is thinking. I know she's pissed. In her eyes, someone who continues to give so much to a man she despises, she sees me, giving too much to my partner. She thinks I'm foolish. And maybe I am! Maybe I am foolish to trust and be vulnerable. But at least I am not with someone for the sake of not being completely alone.

[teatoohottohandle]

[teatoohottohandle]

lately i have been so uneasy around men.

I will be walking the boys and if a man happens across our walking path, we will cross or if we can't then I'll hold my breath and try to hold my gaze steady straight ahead. it's like i want to disappear and be invisible and also want to come across as unbothered and completely unfuckwithable.

lately 2 boys in my neighborhood have been harassing me and calling me racial slurs.

last week I saw a boy cuss out a janitor and then the people around him who called him out on it.

2 months ago, a boy accidentally or purposefully brushed his arm against my chest.

every Tuesday and Thursday when I'm supervising a high school club, I see boys act hard talk big and never do shit.

I'm perturbed. I'm sensitive to all of these things and freeze when toxic masculinity disrupts my peace or what could have been a pleasant moment.

it's so easy to write "next time I will _________" but to unfreeze and change my conflict avoidance tendencies is so hard. it is so difficult because I am also scared.

those boys who call me racial slurs won't do shit.

that high school boy who cussed out the janitor won't do shit.

that boy whose arm brushed against my chest is someone I'll never see again.

why am I scared then??? if I know these boys won't ever do shit because all they do is talk the walk, then what? what am I so afraid of?

[teatoohottohandle]

Grief, healing

Earlier today, I got dinner with my cousin and my brother. As we're catching up, we talk about our gay uncles who are living their best lives. My cousin says, "At least one of them is happy," referring to our aunts and uncles. To which I respond, "I think our mom is happy too."

My brother releases a snide comment, "Well she would be if she could get the family together."

My cousin attempts to diffuse this situation by stating, "Well first things first, she's gotta get her siblings together."

It's a snide comment because this is the second year I've gone without talking to Lisa, who is my biological sister. And in actuality, I have another sister who also doesn't speak to Lisa, which I personally feels like says more about Lisa than it does the rest of the family.

I didn't know what to say to his snide comment or to my cousin's quick diffusion but as I was showering after dinner, I decided to practice saying things:

Let me ask you this, what do you think the actual problem is -- that her children don't talk to each other or that her children have hurt each other and don't apologize or acknowledge their harmful actions?

What makes you say that?

You saying that makes me feel a little attacked and makes me feel like you're insinuating I'm the problem. Could you explain what you mean?

What do you think would help this family heal?

I got the last question from my partner who asked me this last week -- what would I like for Lisa to do to feel like we could have an amicable relationship?

I told my partner that I wasn't sure. A formal, sincere, authentic apology would be one... Therapy. Family therapy. And the understanding that conversations are only going to be limited to small talk like the weather. Because Lisa demonstrates high / extreme narcissistic patterns...

[teatoohottohandle]

Spotify Blend~December

Listening to me and Jose's Spotify Blend and I think it's just the sweetest thing ever. Sometimes when I think about our love, I just feel the most comfortable and softest being ever. I feel like butter melting on toast, fried rice, eggs, noodles, etc...

Our love is so soft and tender and it's like soft, mellifluous voices echoing in a cozy room filled with blankets, pillows. Our love is precious and it's something I've never experienced before. I'm thankful for Jose, Chaco, and Iago. They remind me to be soft, to be sanded down, to be smooth.

[teatoohottohandle]

[teatoohottohandle]

November love letter

In an act to center joy and joyous moments in my life, I want to dedicate a love letter to myself. Not a to-do list, not a checklist, not means of "productivity" to showcase how I'm successful or to try to discern meaning into my life by believing crossing something off my list is enough (though it is satisfactory).

This month, I want to be present. This past weekend I had the most positive and lovely experience being with my partner. I felt surrounded by love in their presence. We had no official plans, we just met up at my place, ate, talked, laughed, and took everything one thing at a time. We got to workout together on Sunday. They're my first romantic partner where I feel comfortable enough to expose myself like that. Where I feel comfortable enough to act silly and get a tough workout done -- no matter how ridiculous I may look.

In that same vein, I've only been going to the gym if someone else is going. I'd like to go by myself, for myself this month. I'd like to experience the confidence I feel when I'm working out with my partner. But I'm also questioning it -- do I feel comfortable working out because my partner is there or am I deflecting discomfort in the inconsistent belief that I'm not capable of doing things by myself and that I need someone to validate me? I think in challenging myself to go to the gym once alone will motivate me this month and see for myself which one it is.

---

I fell asleep writing this love letter at the beginning of the month and now I am revisiting it at the end of the month.

I just want to say that I did go to the gym by myself this month. Just for me. I got a leg workout done on the leg machines and it felt great. One, just to know that I went for myself. And two, I didn't have to wait on anybody.

As I reflect on this month, there were some unforeseeable things and things that were planned, I just didn't plan for them intentionally. For one, I'm dog sitting for my sister right now. Her dog had gotten sick on my rug and then my robot vacuum went off on its scheduled time and ran over it. I caught Chaco on my camera barking at something. It was the fact that my sister's dog was doing his business and Chaco was probably upset and barking at him to get him to stop.

Secondly, my partner and I aired everything out -- everything we felt like wasn't right or going as well as it could in our relationship. Although we've been experiencing some really great and wholesome moments of rest, relaxation, and comfort, we had admittedly gotten too comfortable in some aspects of our lives like the ways in which we communicate. I had gotten too comfortable with the ways in which my family dislikes my partner. I had gotten too comfortable with the ways in which my family talks about my partner.

While it was a tough conversation, it was a much-needed one. I think we're stronger for it.

Thirdly, I had been expecting this for a minute, but I just found out that I won't be teaching next semester. It's disappointing. I really enjoyed teaching.

Lastly, even though this wasn't planned -- I finally hung up some frames. Granted it's not complete, I still have more to add, but I like how my office looks and I love the view from my desk now more than ever :)

I have really enjoyed writing this love letter instead of a to-do list. I resisted the urge to write a to do list on purpose because I wanted to effuse love in everything I do this month. To encourage intentionality and impact. I deserve more love and so do my loved ones <3

[teatoohottohandle]

Fuck capitalism & micromanagers

hands in soapy water

wrapped around a rag

to clean and mop my home.

I am thinking about how I am grateful.

For warm and cool shelter,

for protection,

for a loving family -- chosen and born into,

for my two dogs,

for a loving partner.

I am satiated. I am full. I am tired.

I am sending healing thoughts to those who don't feel full.

To those who feel like their lives are not complete but they have work, a 9 to 5, a Monday through Friday, an "and other duties as necessary," 40 hours spent being ineffective and difficult because

They are not satiated, they are not full, they are still tired.

[teatoohottohandle]

high schoolers/gen-z

I have been teaching high schoolers in a dual enrollment class for the past 4 months now. Dual enrollment meaning they are able to earn both high school and college credit.

I started out with 11 students and it's since whittled down to 5 -- these 5 are seniors and going various routes and pathways, but they are 5 close friends. It's endearing to have 5 close friends in class. It's something that you won't find too often in college at least. I appreciate them and I like having them, I think they're hilarious in their own little Gen-Z ways.

One time, I had walked into class, late, and I saw that one of the students was crying. There were 2 other students I had never seen before who were comforting this student. She had looked up at me and resumed crying. I was about to start class but noticed she had her face buried in her hands still, her elbows on the desk. So I paused and I asked, "Are you okay? Do you need to see a counselor?"

I kid you not she was faking it. She then launched into a verbal attack against a fellow classmate and claimed, "He fucked my boyfriend for the 4th time!" To which some of the class exploded in unstoppable laughter and I, being an adult who wasn't sure to take this seriously or not, repeated again, "Do you want to see a counselor?" They then proceeded to "pretend fight." It was one of the worst classes I had with them. They later apologized for having a "Fake Jerry Springer episode" but I wasn't pleased with that at all.

I've noticed over the past 4 months that they enjoy opportunities to touch each other.

The student who was fake crying for their fake Jerry Springer episode has attempted to squat several of her classmates.

Today, another student wrestled another student to the ground.

There was another pseudo, less dramatic Jerry Springer-esque fight that took place but because I had given those students 0 (zeroes) for participation and attendance that last time, they had quickly stemmed it before it became an episode.

And maybe touch is a way to communicate. Touch through an act of playfulness, touch as an act of recognizing each other, seeing each other, attempting to connect with one another.

I wanted to write about this and reflect on it because I saw someone I went to middle school with post on their IG Story, "Remember how in middle school you used to hug everybody you knew."

In high school we stopped and then in college I resumed my freshman year and then I became cognizant of touch and became uncomfortable with touching, with hugging, with any display of affection.

I long to hold my friends' hands, to give loved ones kisses on their cheeks as greetings. I just don't know where to start.