My 2023 - My Mother, My Wife and an Album

2023 is a rough year for me. Although I experienced hard times through the year, I still has a lot of things needs to be thankful.

This year, we (my family) found out that my mother has a cancer. This is the roughest time of this year cause I can't do anything financially for my mother cause I am also in my financial crisis.
And this is my top priority to thank about, HIVE PH. This community helps my family a lot. Financially, emotionally and mentally. I was so sad and drunk when I wrote this post. Actually, maybe I can't create that post if I wasn't drunk. And that time, I wasn't sure if my post will be read and be supported. I just did it for my mother, come what may.
After I posted that blog, I finally slept. When I woke up hours later, I'm so surprise that my post got an impact to whole Hive community. It was overwhelmed. The prayers and supports are massive. I read all the comments to my mother while she is lying on her bed. And she thank me for doing that for her. And she also thank all of you for the prayers and supports she received. She is now on her chemotherapy and even though her body changes a lot, she is stronger now than before. And for that, I want to thank all of you Hivers. To the whales who supported that post ( I don't want to mention them cause I don't want to make a scene just to be noticed) I all thank you. And of course, to the Filipino community HIVE PH, I thank you all.

One of the highlights of my life this year is when I went to Thailand. Yeah, I'm still in financial crisis but I still did it. How? This is the story I never told.
To start, this is a short post I created that tells a lot but not detailed. Way back 2022, my wife and I got broke up. Since the pandemic, we had no chance to see each other. She is in Singapore working and I just here waiting for her financial support (that's a shame). She cuts her financial support to me and that is why I really struggled a lot. And yes, it is not her fault that I'm lazy. It's all my fault.
But I'm a free man, and I have to accept the consequences of being a free man.
And one of the consequences is losing the love of my life.
We started not to talk to each other. And eventually, I checked on her on what is happening to her. And one time this year, she went back to the Philippines. And we don't even saw each other.
She wants to talk to me just the two of us and she told me that she will be back here on her birthday vacation on October. I was excited about that. But when the time is being closed to October, she changed her mind. Her planned changed and she wants to go to Thailand alone. And that saddened me.
October arrived and I'm still hoping to see her but she didn't changed her mind. She told me that she will have a minor surgery in Thailand that's why she chose to be there. We often video chatting before that, and when she is in Thailand, we still talk. She even showed me where she is staying in Phuket. And then I asked her to go home here after her minor surgery so I can take care of her while recovering. She don't want to. She said that she can't manage to travel after the surgery. After her surgery, she went to her hotel and we video chat. I told her who will take care of her. And she told me no one. I joked about me going there instead of she going here, and she seriously thinks about it. In my surprised, she asked me if I really want to go there in Thailand, and I said of course I want to. She asked me the details of my passport and she booked me a flight to Bangkok for the next day. And that is how I got to travelled abroad without money. Hehehe. It was fun and exciting to travel abroad. And the best is, I was with the love of my life.

And my other highlight and achievement this year is the released of my solo album.
Every musician is dreaming about releasing an album. And I did it! Even though it is not released by a major record label, it is still my achievement.
At first I don't know how to do it and I watched bunch of videos and read a lot of post and tutorials about how to release a song on Spotify.
At first, I tried to release a single song from my band. And it was a success!
4th Enchant - Wonderful Things
After that, I planned to release my other songs. Now, it has to be an album. I gathered all the songs I've finished and I started to complete all other unreleased tracks one by one. It was not easy since I only have 12 days to complete all of it just to be release it on the target date, December 26, my birthday. Day after day, what I was doing is being harder and harder. I don't know but the pressure is pushing me and stressed me out. That started my sleepless nights.
I always thinks that I need to finished all tracks before December 13 because there is a 2-week review at most before the distributor release it. And I did it before December 12 ends (around 11pm), buzzer beater.

The day has come, December 26, it was 1 in the morning here in the Philippines, the album was released on Spotify. I woke up early around 2am and I remembered that I forgot to edit ahead of time the post I made in this community to promote my album. In my excitement, my brain was wide awake and finished the post and also did a Facebook post.
After that, I'm exhausted to thinks that I need to wake up early to prepare foods for my birthday. Very exhausting but it was also exciting and goal achieving moment.