Where is Tim?

 We are trapped in a legal system where one cannot see how he is, nor can they help him work out the issues, and feed him the love and therapy he needs to carry on with some semblance of a quality life. I am so disappointed with our mental health care system. There are definately days when I feel all I am surrounded by is people who cannot help.

Look at this place on media. It is disturbing to think I may have a family member here. Nothing about it has a positive vibe. It is the concealment of a nightmare of how many billions go to competing with other countries to be the best of the best and so little money goes to creating safe spaces for people to heal.

Some woman posting she has never been there, giving it five stars is insane.

One's visual senses feed their brain - and no family member going through the grief we have been through wants to see this horror story as input and consider their relative or friend may be there.

TERRELL STATE HOSPITAL - Updated July 2025 - 25 Photos - 1200 E Brin St, Terrell, Texas - Hospitals - Phone Number - Yelp

A Letter to Tim Merriman

7/9/2025

Dear Tim,

We were separated in 2004. I do not purport to know what Julia told you, yet we were in dire circumstances by then. I want you to know how much we love you. 

- Your funny jokes

- Your exceptionally talented guitar playing

- The philosophy and knowledge you instilled in me through your literary journy

We had a very angry family Tim. One which could have done so many things differently. I did not learn this until well into adulthood. I learned negotiation, forgiveness, reconciliation and most of all forgiving ourselves. I also now understand just how broken the process was for getting help for you. I was very lucky to have been surrounded by friends and a good workplace that taught me so many things such as:

- perspective

- negotiation

- caring about the community even when it is at odds with what you have to offer

I care Tim. We were so very close. We were not given the skills in our family to let go of guilt (for just being kids or human) and we were not given the skills to tackle issues without anger. This started from when we were tiny, Greg raging when being woken up, Stan raging over crumbs on the counter. We had a quiet mother who was coping in her own way. So many things she and I would have taken on together as adults such as getting help "together" not individually. Yet she is not here for it. We all suffered that grief and loss together.

You deserved a positive and beautiful world full of hugs, forgiveness and love Tim. Car accidents were not your fault. TV's falling were not your fault. It is just how the world works. Bad/painful things happen and they pad the way for learning and becoming better people. 

Yet you did not get to blossom with me. We were divided: by a girlfriend I had stopped communicating with well before she decided to date you. By our sister who had different ideas of what "help" looks like. By a father who chose rage when I told him - we had met a point where we were not dealing with sibling rivaly something is wrong. I begged and pleaded for him not to get angry with you. Help, calm, and happiness, and conflict resolution is not a solo effort Tim, and we should have been helping each other together.

I now have the hindsight and perspective to know we should have been in counseling "together" back in 1993. Not separately. Not punished by police or court systems. Not punished by our parents. Truly working on the issues of our health and calm. We lacked supervision from qualified individuals, honestly from birth. People do what they can with the skills they have. Your father loves you, your sister love you - yet the skills we needed were so advanced to work through it. We were not fortunate enough to have encountered them at the right time or place.

I love you Tim. I want you to have peace for the remainder of your days on this planet. To appreciate the warmth of the sun, the little things like a savored bite of your favorite food, enjoying the smiles when people see just how smart and talented you are. To remember the good and the funny things: blammo, caviar pasta, skateboarding with Billy. Nothing is your fault and you must remember that. We have a terrible set of systemic programming in our family for blaming ourselves or others. Sometimes it is just life, and we were just kids! 

My hope and dream was that we could communicate again one day. That I could earn enough money to build a farm and have both you and Julia work on recovery with me. There are so many bad forces in the world one has to ignore, yet what is of value is being in it together and working out how to make the best of it, and how to forget the bad parts.  I could tell you all the things I learned over the years, and we could wipe the slate so the state of Texas and horrible health care system we have would quit penalizing you for just being human. You are brilliant, funny, talented and so worthy of more. Nothing was handled well.

I miss you and I do hope we get a chance to see each other some day. You were my big brother who made me hotdogs, saved me from bullies and taught me how to fight. I would love to see you in a place where you do not feel you need to do so.

So Much Love Still,

Moira

 

We've Moved & E-Mail Changes

We are unpacking, settling in, and are enjoying the summer vibes of San Antonio!

 

Our e-mail changed. You can use the old one, although it is read less often, or comment with your Google account here for the updated address. 

 

My old e-mail vasquez.moira at gmail still works yet it is not read very often. I never did have control if someone communicated with the person who obtained moira.vasquez. I dropped the owner of that email address a note in 2005! Never heard back from them.

 

Someone started doing a fair amount of online impersonations of me and spoofed emails to people I knew in 2016. I moved our email to a server where we could better control our security settings in 2018. It is working really well!

We have been using something called DMARC/DKIM/SPF. That is a lot of alphabet soup; however, in short, and our spam was reduced by approximately 90%. 

 

Additionally, we moved to a provider that so far, has done really well with not releasing metadata into the wild and providing end to end encryption services that are simple to use. While I was relying on typical commerical e-mail services, I was seeing a fair amount of web bots created from metadata marketers were collecting. This was annoying and had to be fixed ;-)

 

Since I am on a Google platform with this blog, it would seem strange to promote our new email service here, so I will reserve that for later.

 

Unfortunately, I cannot know who wrote who from email accounts from prior jobs or consulting engagements. If you received anything suspicious please do let me know! I was appraised there were probably a few emails sent under my account by a former boss, on servers we do not control or manage when I left a consulting assignment.

We are back in Texas, so if anyone wants to get in touch please drop a line or you can reach me at (201) 496-1222‬.

Riverwalk in San Antonio