New Year, 2021

Remember when I said I hope 2020 won’t be a fucking ratty year in the Year of the Rat because of some virus from China? Yea, that happened. Global pandemic. It's a shitty, ratty year. A lost year, or a year of being lost. Or a year of being lost, and in the quietness of Covid-quarantine, you find meaning. In any case, 2020 will be one for the books. It will be remembered for years to come, while the long-term consequences for our world are yet to be imagined.

If you’ve got plans, forget about it

For me, 2020 started with hopeful energy. I was a few months into a new role for a clinical-stage start-up. After getting laid off last year from a company and team that I liked, I never thought I would end up with one that would equal in measure. I was wrong, and there I was enjoying the new year in a quirky office, on the second floor of a Ukrainian-owned art gallery, with gothic paintings of cats and a leaky roof that required strategically placed buckets when it rained. I hated the commute, sardined in a train car in the morning and having to tiptoe along the urinary-fecal streets of San Francisco, but I loved that I walked every morning. And before it was mandated, by the way, I was already wearing a mask, which got me some weird side-eye looks. It’s a common habit in Asia – to protect yourself, you protect your community. Professionally, I was satisfied; so, January was spent planning for the big wedding.

The plan started out as a vision of the moon rising above us in a planetarium while GAPA Men’s Chorus sang a Teresa Teng ballad. But I signed a contract with Mills College instead to stage a wedding and a theatrical chorus concert in one. Everyone would be encouraged to attend in their most colorful, sequined-glittered-shiny-feathery-best. Danny and I figured it’s a gay wedding. Why bore? There would be a Chinese-Ilocano banquet afterwards in Chinatown. Seafood, lechon, goat dishes, and a bottomless rice pot. Dancing, of course. Maybe, karaoke.

Then February came. Thousands had died and were dying in China, Italy and Spain. There were whispers of the virus making its way through our airports from Europe. People started hoarding toilet paper! It all went blurry crazy. So, we decided the wedding would have to wait; we needed to take care of family.

Li, a tribute

Li in younger days

In April, a month after the quarantine mandates in California, my father-in-law Li died after battling cancer. He was 85. We managed a socially-distanced funeral. It was a little surreal with Zoom-ed viewers, but nonetheless, it was a nice gathering to bid farewell to the man we loved. Danny wrote a beautiful homage to him, here. In the early 1970s, He and his wife Jane moved from Taiwan to Canada with their two kids. From there, they made their way to Kansas, and then California. He worked for an airline, the meat packing industry, and for years, as an AC Transit driver in the Bay Area. They eventually raised one scientist and one lawyer-executive. Li was full of spirit and charm, with an open heart that said Life was a party and everyone was a welcomed guest. He danced and sang, smiled and joked, to the end. That was the man I got to know. I can hear him when Danny laughs. We miss him.

The Wedding

July. Danny and I got married. Why let a virus stop a perfectly good, pragmatic thing to do, we thought. We have health benefits to think about. It was a 30-minute Microsoft Teams teleconference with Alameda County. We wore aloha formals and slacks and were barefoot in our living room. We didn’t want to crash the system, so we opted for a small gathering of the planned wedding party and immediate family members to tune in. My parents were behind me, masked and happy. It was short, sweet, and memorably funny. We spent $200. That is $15,000 less than we would have spent, and, you know, we’re absolutely okay with that. Also, our nuptials got a mention in the New York Times.

Hawai’i

Swim, eat, hike, work, gaze. I left for the Big Island in September, quarantined for 14 days, and stayed there for over a month. Danny joined for a time. It was our honeymoon of sorts. Here are some Instagram posts during my working stay-cation. Also, with a couple of companions.

It is a rare thing to find a place you can call a spiritual home, an escape, and this was one of them.

The silver linings

I count myself fortunate. Many have lost their lives and livelihoods this year. I still have a job. I get the luxury of eating whenever I want and have a roof over my head. My health is relatively good.

I got married - something I actually did not think possible only a decade ago. Imagine that. And I just completed the refinance of the house my brother and I bought with, and for, our parents twenty years ago. (Interest rates are low!). Two big ticket items on the vision board checked off this year.

We lost Li, and my friend Candi, in 2020. But many we love are hanging in there. Special mention to my friend Heather in PA who got to officially adopt her little girl. And I know folks that have survived this damn plague. And there are vaccines in the works. And that thawed my heart.

Oh, Joe and Kamala won. I am guessing that's traumatic for many. Not for me. So there's hope.

So, yes, what a shitty year. But, also, I'm blessed to be here to say goodbye to it, and looking forward for the fights ahead.