Another HappierAbroad veteran member has apparantly passed away

[publicduende]

It's just kind of crazy. One moment you're feeling on top of the world, holding your infant son... the next minute, you're gone from this life. Dave's final blog entry was eery. He wrote it in a bit of a tongue-in-cheek fashion, as he always did, it was titled "the baby is six months old - and I have survived". Just a few weeks later, he's dead. Life really takes no prisoners, never holds back, and can end terrifyingly abruptly. We all ought to make the most of it... so much precious time, wasted. I feel sorry for his son, who will never know his dad. But at least Dave left a legacy, which is more than a lot of us can say. A lasting impact, a footprint not easily washed away by the waves of time.



It kind of makes me think, about how we have so few guarantees in life. About how I'd visit his blog from time to time, waiting for an update. And how now I know there never will be another. Perhaps one day I'll be old, writing about my life online somewhere, only to keel over and my followers being none the wiser... and the world keeps turning, and life goes on, and we're no longer a part of it. Such a bittersweet reality.

We're all just a collection of (mostly) faceless unknowns, gathered together in an obscure corner of the web. And things like this just put the whole thing in perspective, don't they? Give a face to the faceless, and sort of humanize screen names that we see as silly little throwaways. I don't know why it gets to me a lot all of a sudden, but somehow, it does. Maybe I've grown into an overly sentimental bastard.

Beautiful words, @MarcosZeitola, definitely worth spending them for one of HA's beautiful souls.

Besides a few trolls, every and each one of us is a human being with a story worth telling, and worth listening to.

[kangarunner]

Beautiful words, @MarcosZeitola, definitely worth spending them for one of HA's beautiful souls.

"beautiful souls" - Most people in this world are garbage.

[publicduende]

"beautiful souls" - Most people in this world are garbage.

If that's all you think, that's all you see.

[Yohan]

Of course one shouldn't speak ill of the (recently) dead but having a child at age 70 is just idiotic, especially when you're from a group whose life expectancy is just 73. Dave must have thought he would beat the odds and live to see his son grow up, too bad for his son that he lost.

To be honest, I share your opinion - it's not nice to talk like that, but his wife is now a widow and the child is a half-orphan and I am really worried about their future, especially financially. I don't know if she and the child have any claim to receive some money after his death (widow allowance, orphan support) - Not sure about his pension claims and even about his nationality (USA?).

But we are all individuals, it was his decision and she agreed, up to them - not my business.

However if you ask me if I would ever consider to become a father with 70....My answer is a clear NO! Not my way of life. I am now 71, my wife same age, and my older daughter is 45, my younger daughter is 42, my older granddaughter is 6 already, the younger one is 3....

[MarcosZeitola]

To be honest, I share your opinion - it's not nice to talk like that, but his wife is now a widow and the child is a half-orphan and I am really worried about their future, especially financially. I don't know if she and the child have any claim to receive some money after his death (widow allowance, orphan support) - Not sure about his pension claims and even about his nationality (USA?).

But we are all individuals, it was his decision and she agreed, up to them - not my business.

However if you ask me if I would ever consider to become a father with 70....My answer is a clear NO! Not my way of life. I am now 71, my wife same age, and my older daughter is 45, my younger daughter is 42, my older granddaughter is 6 already, the younger one is 3....

I somewhat agree with you, Yohan, and @Seeker too, to a degree. But on the other hand... if a man is otherwise healthy, he could calculate the age he may reach. All one has to do is look at the age your own parents and grandparents passed. Say you're a middle-aged guy and your parents and grandparents all lived to be in their nineties. It's a reasonable assumption at this point that you, yourself, will also live to a ripe old age. Barring unforseen circumstances, you may be seventy and live another twenty-odd years.

In such a situation, if you're a healthy bloke, and you have a much younger partner, why not have a kid? I mean Dave married into a large traditional Filipino family. His wife was more or less expected to birth a little half-blood kiddo sooner or later. The questions would never end, had she not popped one out. He gave her a little gift, for the rest of her life, in the form of a strong and healthy son. Had he not done so, she would have now been a childless widow in her thirties, a rather pitiful creatures in the eyes of her fellow Filipinos.

For any man to marry a young Filipina and deny her a child, is rather cruel. Because I could probably count the number of Filipinas who don't want children on one hand, and I've met heaps of them. In the younger, more well-educated cohort one may find such a Filipina, as @publicduende can no doubt attest to, but among a poor, rural and more simple Filipina such as Dave's wife, the likelihood of her or her family being A-okay with zero kids is... well, close to zero.

[gsjackson]

[ his wife is now a widow and the child is a half-orphan and I am really worried about their future, especially financially. I don't know if she and the child have any claim to receive some money after his death (widow allowance, orphan support) - Not sure about his pension claims and even about his nationality (USA?).

I'm fairly certain she's entitled to his social security (US) benefits for life, which quite likely is over $2K/month. That will go a long way in the Phils. I just hope the necessary bureaucratic steps were made clear to her ahead of time, because it can be a hassle. I'd also be a little surprised if Dave, who seemed like an intelligent and responsible guy, hadn't made other provisions, such as a life insurance policy. Don't know if there's any company pension to which she would be entitled. Since he likely survived his parents, there's probably some savings that didn't get eaten up by obligations to his first family, or wasn't left to them in his will.

And then too, I'd imagine families in the Phils have a way of pulling together for economic survival.

[Cornfed]

[ his wife is now a widow and the child is a half-orphan and I am really worried about their future, especially financially. I don't know if she and the child have any claim to receive some money after his death (widow allowance, orphan support) - Not sure about his pension claims and even about his nationality (USA?).

I'm fairly certain she's entitled to his social security (US) benefits for life, which quite likely is over $2K/month.

WTF, that's as bad as funding Israel and the Ukraine war.

[publicduende]

[ his wife is now a widow and the child is a half-orphan and I am really worried about their future, especially financially. I don't know if she and the child have any claim to receive some money after his death (widow allowance, orphan support) - Not sure about his pension claims and even about his nationality (USA?).

I'm fairly certain she's entitled to his social security (US) benefits for life, which quite likely is over $2K/month. That will go a long way in the Phils. I just hope the necessary bureaucratic steps were made clear to her ahead of time, because it can be a hassle. I'd also be a little surprised if Dave, who seemed like an intelligent and responsible guy, hadn't made other provisions, such as a life insurance policy. Don't know if there's any company pension to which she would be entitled. Since he likely survived his parents, there's probably some savings that didn't get eaten up by obligations to his first family, or wasn't left to them in his will.

And then too, I'd imagine families in the Phils have a way of pulling together for economic survival.

I absolutely agree. Dave was too "based" a family man not to have made provisions for after his death. Also, they recently built a house which they own outright so, as you say, even $1,000 a month would give Janet and his kid a comfortable life. $2K, they would be upper class in the Dumaguete countryside.

[Natural_Born_Cynic]

[ his wife is now a widow and the child is a half-orphan and I am really worried about their future, especially financially. I don't know if she and the child have any claim to receive some money after his death (widow allowance, orphan support) - Not sure about his pension claims and even about his nationality (USA?).

I'm fairly certain she's entitled to his social security (US) benefits for life, which quite likely is over $2K/month. That will go a long way in the Phils. I just hope the necessary bureaucratic steps were made clear to her ahead of time, because it can be a hassle. I'd also be a little surprised if Dave, who seemed like an intelligent and responsible guy, hadn't made other provisions, such as a life insurance policy. Don't know if there's any company pension to which she would be entitled. Since he likely survived his parents, there's probably some savings that didn't get eaten up by obligations to his first family, or wasn't left to them in his will.

And then too, I'd imagine families in the Phils have a way of pulling together for economic survival.

I absolutely agree. Dave was too "based" a family man not to have made provisions for after his death. Also, they recently built a house which they own outright so, as you say, even $1,000 a month would give Janet and his kid a comfortable life. $2K, they would be upper class in the Dumaguete countryside.

But she is gonna squander all of it... Because you know.. Filipinos are "Not Good at Saving money" and you mentioned that in another thread that only the "Upper Class" Filipinos knows how to save money and spend it on investments. In addition, her deadbeat relatives and neighbors would flock to her and ask her to borrow money or help them.

[Natural_Born_Cynic]

[ his wife is now a widow and the child is a half-orphan and I am really worried about their future, especially financially. I don't know if she and the child have any claim to receive some money after his death (widow allowance, orphan support) - Not sure about his pension claims and even about his nationality (USA?).

I'm fairly certain she's entitled to his social security (US) benefits for life, which quite likely is over $2K/month.

WTF, that's as bad as funding Israel and the Ukraine war.

I bet all of that 2k a month will go to her deadbeat relatives, neighbors, and shopping sprees and eating at Jollibee's every single day.
Filipinos are terrible at saving money. It's their national trait.

[MarcosZeitola]

But she is gonna squander all of it... Because you know.. Filipinos are "Not Good at Saving money" and you mentioned that in another thread that only the "Upper Class" Filipinos knows how to save money and spend it on investments. In addition, her deadbeat relatives and neighbors would flock to her and ask her to borrow money or help them.

In Dave's widow Janet's defense, she actually lived with him in America for several years. She has a degree, in what I do not know, but she held a job for a few years in America. So she's not exactly a full-on country bumpkin with zero life experience. I'm not going to accuse her of being some sort of grand financial wizard but she's far from stupid, from what I heard of the lady.

[gsjackson]

So, turns out it's a little more complicated than her just receiving 100 percent of his SS benefits. It's actually the child who is entitled to the benefits right now -- 75 percent of what his benefits were. That could still be around $2K/mo., since I had the impression that he worked white collar jobs steadily until his 60s. She actually won't get survivor benefits until she turns 60, which is 25 years from now. The kid gets them until 18. So I guess there will a gap of seven years when neither will be entitled to any SS benefits. But if at all prudent they should be able to sock away enough to tide them over through a seven-year rainy day.

[publicduende]

But she is gonna squander all of it... Because you know.. Filipinos are "Not Good at Saving money" and you mentioned that in another thread that only the "Upper Class" Filipinos knows how to save money and spend it on investments. In addition, her deadbeat relatives and neighbors would flock to her and ask her to borrow money or help them.

Look, all I know about Dave and Janet (and other satellite characters) is what they let transpire through the blog. If we want to be cynical at all costs, considering what @gsjackson said, it might even be that "the family" pressed Janet to have a kid knowing that it was the only way for her/them to get some handouts from the US government.

We will never know reality. We know that Filipinos are masters of disguise. Behind all those friendly smiles and inclusive, welcoming behaviour, any of them is capable of plotting a "kill the golden goose" kind of act. Again, that is, being cynical.

I prefer to be less cynical, especially towards what sounded (again, blog be witness) a wonderful couple with a good supporting extended family in Dumaguete, and especially considering we talking about someone who just died.

[MarcosZeitola]

it might even be that "the family" pressed Janet to have a kid knowing that it was the only way for her/them to get some handouts from the US government.

How many 35-year-old rural Filipinas married to a foreigner (of any age) have to be 'pressed' into having a child? I'd wager 99.9% of them willingly have a child, because they want the "tall-nosed mestizo kid" and are quite eager to get one at any cost. They'd feel rather bummed out NOT to have a kid, if anything. No family pressure required at all. A non-upperclass Filipina who is 'childfree' is a unicorn, a mythological creature which may exist but I haven't yet encountered...

[publicduende]

it might even be that "the family" pressed Janet to have a kid knowing that it was the only way for her/them to get some handouts from the US government.

How many 35-year-old rural Filipinas married to a foreigner (of any age) have to be 'pressed' into having a child? I'd wager 99.9% of them willingly have a child, because they want the "tall-nosed mestizo kid" and are quite eager to get one at any cost. They'd feel rather bummed out NOT to have a kid, if anything. No family pressure required at all. A non-upperclass Filipina who is 'childfree' is a unicorn, a mythological creature which may exist but I haven't yet encountered...

Exactly. I was being cynical.