So when I arrived, David had an amazing job working at Netgate. He had been friends with the CEO for a long time. Their children went to the same school. David wanted to add me to the lease. We were discussing it in early October. But, on Oct. 3,2022, his boss called him and fired him. David was stunned. It was like 4 days until the employees got their yearly bonuses. (David’s bonus was more money than I made most tax years.) When his final paycheck showed up as a deposit (like waiting overnight). David checked the amount. It was 9k. He paid all his bills online. Then he wrote a rent check for the landlady and mailed it off.
He got a call from the landlady the next week. She said the rent check bounced. David was stunned. There should have been a few thousand extra. He went and checked the bank. Somehow, the deposit amount changed between posted and actual. (Only a CEO could do this kind of thing). David went from getting 9k to getting 3k. He had 60 hours of PTO on that final paycheck. But somehow, that had been changed to him owing 5 hours of PTO to the company. He filed for unemployment. Netgate said they had “reasonable cause” to fire him.
Meanwhile, David talked with his landlady. He had been renting this location for 18-years. He had paid every month on time. He asked her to wait. She told him to get out or she would evict him. Well, that stopped me from signing the lease completely.
David realized he could pull his SSI income. So he applied to do that. It was not until Jan of 2023, that he learned that SSI is based on “yearly” income not “monthly” income. He couldn’t get SSI for November and December because he made over $100,000 dollars that year.
It took Dave almost 2 months to get his Unemployment money. There was a ton of miscommunication. A ton. Meanwhile, we were living on my measly $700 dollars every two weeks.
We tried applying for other properties. But David did not have his award letter and Unemployment Insurance did not count. I was also on Unemployment.
Dave played a trump card on the landlady. He filed for bankruptcy before she could file eviction papers. This stopped the eviction and gave us a few months to try to find a place to live. Then she started doing odd things. She started walking into our apartment without notice filming on her camera. Her door looks straight into my bedroom. She said she had the legal right to use our front door because it was a second exit from her apartment. I called bullshit. I asked her if we could use her apartment as a second exit. She said no. She also started using her AC 24/7 and running like a hairdryer all day during the day and constantly keeping her laundry machine on. David didn’t tell me until Feb of 2023, that she was tripling the electric bill every month. She also started coming in the apartment at like 2AM or 3AM to walk around the try the doors. I almost attacked her one night because she was wandering around in the dark in our apartment.
Shockingly, no one in the church offered us a place to live. I finally found the rumors through the grapevine. An unmarried female (me) was engaged and living with my fiancé. I ended up telling off multiple church members for gossip. (David and I were not having sex. My parents raised me to wait until marriage. At least my Mom always lectured me about that.) This actually hurt me incredibly deeply. Incredibly. I told a lot of people off.
David asked me to marry him on his birthday. (November 2, 2022.) It was a promise to care for me. Love me. Support my decisions. Provide for me. It was the sweetest proposal. Way better than Matthew’s in a bar. I said, “yes.” David gave me a diamond that was in his family line since the 1920s.
David asked me to marry him on his birthday. (November 2, 2022.) It was a promise to care for me. Love me. Support my decisions. Provide for me. It was the sweetest proposal. Way better than Matthew’s in a bar. I said, “yes.” David gave me a diamond that was in his family line since the 1920s.
Now I started packing. I was pushing David to pick and choose what to keep. He ended up renting a U-Haul Storage Unit. 15×15. Thankfully, his men’s small group (full of strong guys in their 20s) showed up to help us move it all in early December.
I re-homed Brook (the cat). As she was the easiest to rehome. I started prepping the car for us to live in it. I took down a lanai screen and cut it up so that the back windows would have a screen and could be down as we slept. I prepped to keep Whisper (older cat) with us. But this was not going to work because Brook’s rehoming got really bad.
On Jan 26, 2023, David and I got married. The ceremony was lovely. We went to a Hawaiian holy spot. The protector of the sight, walked out to stop us – but then Walt walked over. I think everyone on the island knows Walt. His Cousin sang that famous “Somewhere over the Rainbow” song while playing a ukulele on the beaches of Kailua, Hawaii. They greeted. Walt explained we were here to get married. The Protector sang us into the land. Walt sang us onto the land. Then we were led up. There were five people there besides David and I. Five is a special number for Hawaiians. It represents a “whole hand.” Like the idea of one of their perfect numbers. Walk did the marriage ceremony half in English and half in Hawaiian. He wore traditional Hawaiian marriage robes. David’s wedding vow was precious to me. I was so teary eyed that I couldn’t recall what I had written up as my vow easily.
Walt, Me, and David on the Holy Spot. We did the wedding sitting down.
The next day was out last day at Aupupu Street. We dropped off Whisper at a no-kill shelter. We gave them her bed, catnip toys, heating blanket, litter box, extra cat liter for her, her medications, tons of baby food (she has no teeth, so baby food doesn’t require her to chew), her dry cat food, her wet alternative cat foods, her kitty treats and fifteen years of Vet records. They were stunned and accepted her in under 5 minutes.
The we went home. Loaded up the vehicle. Picked up Brook. She licked David for like 2 hours straight. She is a cave cat, so she crawled under the seats and was very content. And drove to Dave’s church. We were houseless and living in a car as of the evening of Jan 27, 2023.
We were actually in a very good, safe spot. The YMCA was right next door. David signed up both up so we could work out and get showers. The church allowed us to stay overnight in that parking lot. It has a gate that locks into the area, so no cops or noisy visitors. It had a bathroom that was clean that we could access at night. (My first night was a nightmare. I was on my lady’s time. We hadn’t been given the code to get in the bathroom.) It poured rain the night of the 27th. I had to pee. I eventually got a bed wetting pad that we used to keep Brook’s area … and peed on that.
In the morning we met Allen and Jr. Jr. had been there for years. Allen had been living there for 2 years. Both are sober They stopped a lot of the night foot traffic. We learned the code to the spare bathroom key lockbox from them. Over the next month, Allen and Jr. became our closest friends. You can really talk to other houseless people when you are hungry.
Meanwhile, David became to show me Hawaii. The ice cream is from a place called Ubae. It is now my favorite ice-cream. It is made from a Philippine potato purple (so it is not sweet ice cream). While the green swirl was a non-sweet coconut. The flavors is unlike anything I have ever tasted. It is SUPER yummy.
e also took me to the Pali. It is the spot between the male and female side of the island. It was a lovely view.
David snuck in a kiss when I asked him for a shot of the two of us.
But David’s feet were not doing good. They were swelling up. We both had to sleep sitting up. He also could not use his CPap in the vehicle. I was sick. He was sick. We eventually got into IHS HMO.
It was at least a bed. The first time I tried to shower there, there was blood, semen and urine in the shower. I said furk no. So we decided to only show at the YMCA. When we first arrived, the place was disgusting, people were up all night laughing, walking around, doing dope. I was appalled. About a month later, a staff was fired for selling dope to residents. And mostly all new staff were brought in. Rules were reinstated and the nights got quiet.
The new staff cleaned up the bathrooms and started cleaning the common areas every other day. So good.
During this time, David said “Get healthcare.” So I got it. Then got an appointment with a therapist to work on my anxiety. Then I got a psychiatrist appointment and got prescribed an SSRI and a sleep aide. Dave got me a watch that tracks my sleep, so I am able to see now how much I am sleeping / not sleeping.
David’s Chapter 13 finished in courts and was accepted. All his debt but Alimony was cleared. His ex-wife has been very understanding and not asked for alimony all the time we have been houseless. His two daughters (Xochi 23 and Xia 28); however, have not been very mature. They disowned David as a Father when he got engaged to me. They told him that if he would break engagement with me, they would talk to him again. David does not like manipulation. He does not use it as a tactic. He said, “I love you. But you do not get to decide who I love and who I marry.” They have cut off all contact with him. I have watched this deeply hurt him over the holidays.
David decided to send his resume and cover letter to his old parent company, OceanIT. (He worked as the Head of Research and Development for Hoana Medical Devices.) He was hired within 5 days of turning in his application.
Today we got to view apartments. Next Wednesday and Thursday we will have the money for the deposit. By Friday, we should know our move in date to a two-bedroom apartment.
I am so excited.