Theo Nakagawa-Reed
Jiichan
grandparent of Theodore
Contact
died Feb 9 2025
10linked records
22mentions
4questions
2021–2026saved
What the account says about Jiichan
32 records, oldest first2021
Apr 17
2024
Jan 7
birthdays
jan 27 dad
jan 30 kofi
feb 11 maren
apr 12 obaachan
may 16 aunt colleen
jul 19 dez
aug 30 jiichan
sep 3 mom
oct 2 priya
nov 9 hana
dec 14 lu
mine mar 22. miso "june 1" (made up by the shelter)
Oct 6
starting this again. I kept one on Wexcombe for about a month and then stopped…
…because everything I wrote was about Maren and then about not-Maren. it's october now and I've been in this apartment since june and I think I can write about other things.
the radiators came on today. first hiss of the year at about four, while I was inking, and Miso went and sat in front of the one in the bay like…
Nov 9
Hana is 23 today. called her at lunch her time. she got the job at the animal h…
…ospital, the real one with the surgery suite, not the clinic in the strip mall, and she starts the first week of december. she was eating a burrito in her car and crying a little and telling me about a dog named Kevin.
I'm so proud of her I don't know where to put it. she's the one who stayed. I left at eighteen and…
Nov 28
thanksgiving at Aunt Colleen and Marcel's. eleven people. Marcel's nephew Théo…
…(accent, so we are Theo and Théo, he's nine and thinks this is the funniest thing that has ever happened) made me draw his dog four times until the ears were right.
Colleen looks like dad around the eyes when she's listening. she asked about Jiichan's fall before I brought it up, so dad must have told her, so it's a…
Dec 3
Jiichan's workbench, the one in the garage, but it runs the whole length of a s…
…treet. the baby food jars are all there, hundreds, and I'm sorting. every screw I pick up is warm. when I look again the jars are full of tiny persimmons, hard ones, and he's at the far end of the bench with his back to me, counting out loud in Japanese, and I know the numbers up to ten and he's well past that.
Dec 11
xmas, budget 150 total, not going home this year (flights are 600+)
mom: the heron print framed. frame from the thrift store, cut a new mat
dad: wool socks
hana: drawing of her dog-patients wall? ask for photos. + the hot sauce she likes from the co-op
obaachan + jiichan: a drawing of their persimmon tree from the photo on my phone. ink. mail by the 14th
dez: knife sharpening gift cer…
Dec 22
jiichan in the hospital, pneumonia. call mom tonight
Dec 25
christmas here. didn't go home, the flights were over six hundred and december…
…was already built out of portrait money.
video call at ten their time. everyone at mom and dad's except Jiichan, who has been in the hospital since sunday with pneumonia. they say he's responding to the antibiotics. Obaachan held the phone too close so I mostly talked to her forehead. she had on the brooch. Hana car…
2025
Jan 1
2025
- a real savings number: 1,500 by december (have 240)
- one personal project finished, not started. FINISHED
- call Obaachan + Jiichan every sunday
- go home at least once
- stop saying yes to "exposure"
- learn to true a wheel without Ines standing there
- floss
Jan 5
Jiichan went home from the hospital on friday. twelve days. mom says he's weak…
…and annoyed, which she takes as a good sign. he's sleeping in the recliner because the bed is too flat for his chest.
called at eleven. Obaachan answered and said he was resting and then I heard him say something and she said "he wants to know if you have heat." I said yes, radiators. she relayed it. a pause. "he wa…
Feb 9
Jiichan died this morning.
mom called at 6:50 my time. I knew before I picked up because she never calls before noon. he went back into the hospital wednesday. it was the pneumonia again and then his heart. she and Obaachan were with him. she said it was quiet. she said he asked what day it was and Obaachan told him sunday and he said "then The…
Feb 10
mom called at 4:50 her time sunday. Jiichan died this morning. logistics:
- flight: tues 2/11, MSP 6:05am -> DEN -> SMF 11:40am. back wed 2/19, SMF 1:15pm -> MSP 8:50pm direct. 512.40 on the card. mom wants to pay, said no
- hana picks me up
- funeral sat 2/15 11am at the temple, then the lunch after in the hall
- wed + thurs: help mom w/ the photo boards, dad is doing the program
- I say s…
Feb 13
(at mom and dad's, in my old room.) I'm walking from the front door to the mail…
…box and counting. I get to forty-one and I'm not there. forty-two, forty-three. the mailbox is the same distance away every time I look up. the driveway is longer or my steps are shorter. his slippers are on the porch behind me, side by side, pointed out.
Feb 14
"You will need better paper than I had."
Jiichan, the day after I told him I was going to art school. 2016.
Feb 14
what I'm going to say tomorrow. read it slow. look at Obaachan once.
My grandfather, Tadashi Nakagawa, counted things. He counted the persimmons on the tree behind the house every October and wrote the number on the calendar in the kitchen. He counted the steps from his front door to the mailbox, which was forty-one, and he told me that number so many times that I counted them myself t…
Feb 16
Sacramento. sunday night, in my old room, with the glow stars still on the ceil…
…ing. the funeral was yesterday. I want to get the week down before it turns into a story I tell.
tuesday. Hana picked me up at the airport and we didn't say anything until the freeway and then she said "he asked for you" and I said "I know, mom told me" and she said "no, before that. all week. he kept asking if you…
Apr 1
Millrace Community Clinic, appt tues 4/8 at 2:20 w/ Corinne Abara
bring: ID, list of what I take (just the inhaler)
say:
- sleeping 10 hrs and still tired since about november
- not drawing for myself at all
- the thing in february
- it's every winter but this one didn't lift
ask abt: vitamin D, the wrist (still clicks), whether I need anything checked bc of Jiichan's heart stuff
Jun 25
HANA'S HERE july 3-9!!
in: thurs 7/3, SMF -> MSP lands 4:35pm, terminal 1. I pick her up (car has no AC, warn her)
out: wed 7/9, 10:20am
she gets the bed, I take the camping pad
plan:
- 4th: fireworks from the Stone Arch side w/ Dez + Priya, bring the blanket
- sat: lake day, cedar, then the walleye place? or tacos
- sun: I work 10-5, can't…
Jul 15
Hana and I are small, in the backyard on Sorrelwick. the persimmon tree is full…
…of light bulbs instead of fruit, the old kind with the filament, all lit, in the daytime. Jiichan is up the ladder unscrewing them one at a time and handing them down to us and we're putting them in an egg carton. Hana says "these ones are ripe." they're warm and they don't burn.
Aug 30
he would have been 89 today.
called Obaachan. she'd made his breakfast and put it in front of the picture and then eaten it herself "so it wouldn't be wasted, he hated waste." she said the tree has a hundred and sixty this year. she counted.
the claim paid yesterday, 380. I'd asked for 880. five hundred deductible. so the insurance company and t…
Oct 12
north country zine fair, sat 10/11. half table w/ Sam again
zines: birds (reprint) 38 x 6 = 228, radiators 19 x 5 = 95, NEW one "41 steps" (8 pages, about counting, kind of about Jiichan, didn't say so) 44 x 5 = 220
prints: 8x10 21 x 15 = 315, 5x7 16 x 8 = 128
total 986. minus table 30 + printing 206.60 = 749
didn't put out the wren prints. the cap
met June, ceramics, two tabl…
Dec 27
Obaachan's ozoni. she made it early bc I leave tomorrow and "you cannot start a…
…year without it, so you will start it now." written at her elbow, she measures nothing, these are my guesses
this is the Kansai kind her mother made (her family was from Wakayama too): WHITE miso broth, ROUND mochi, not grilled. Jiichan's family did the same. dad's side would have clear broth, she says, "if they had…
2026
Feb 9
one year.
called Obaachan at seven her time. she'd already been to the temple. she said the priest got his age wrong and she corrected him in the middle of the chanting.
I used the paper today. one sheet. I've had it for ten years and him gone for one and I took it out of the flat file at noon and it's so heavy and soft it bar…
Mar 12
two things came out today.
one: the hair tie. this morning, in the litter box, intact. black, elastic, not mine. it's June's. it has been somewhere in this apartment since november, under a radiator, waiting. I put it in a bag and then I put the bag in the outside bin. Miso ate a full dinner and attacked the bathmat.
two: the email. Trevor tex…
Mar 22
28.
I didn't want to do anything and they made me. pho, the four of us. Lu, Dez, Priya. they'd agreed beforehand that I wasn't allowed to look at the bill.
Priya's present is a print of my own bay window with a tiny Miso in it. Dez's is chili crisp. Lu's is a spoke wrench. Hana's box had a photograph I'd never seen: Jiic…
Apr 14
three hours at the rookery this morning with Marit, starting in the dark. thirt…
…y-one degrees. my hands stopped working at about the ninety-minute mark and I drew with my whole arm.
forty herons in dead trees over open water, standing on the nests. they don't do anything for a very long time and then one of them does one thing, slowly. Marit says they're the only bird she knows that seems to be…
Jun 28
JAPAN, april 2027. Obaachan turns 88 on april 12 and is taking some of Jiichan'…
…s ashes to Yuasa.
who: Obaachan, mom, dad, Hana, me. Kenta (the cousin) is meeting us in Wakayama
dates (mom's draft): leave SFO sat 4/3, home wed 4/14. Osaka 2 nights, Yuasa 5, Kyoto 3
my costs:
- flight MSP -> SFO -> KIX: ~1,350 round trip if I book by november
- rail + food + my share of rooms: ~900
- mom + dad ar…
Jul 11
Hana texted this morning asking for my passport number, she's holding flights f…
…or april. I went and got it out of the drawer, out of the envelope with the yen from 2016, and read it to her, and then I read the other line.
it expired june 13th. four weeks ago. it's been lying in a drawer being invalid while I planned a trip to Japan.
I knew it was this year. I wrote "check the date" in a note…
Jul 26
sunday call, 40 min
- the persimmon tree has "too many" this year. she counted 212 green ones from the kitchen window. she's doing his count on the calendar now
- she got the drawing of the red jacket (I sent her the 14-15 sketch). she put it next to his picture. she asked why the bird and the man are standing the same and I said "becaus…
Jul 26
"Then practice."
Obaachan, when I said my kanji isn't good enough to write Jiichan's name on the box for Yuasa.
Sep 8
Wanjiru says illustrators get a dedication too, on p2, under Liesl's. due w/ th…
…e final art.
tries:
- for Jiichan, who counted
- for Tadashi Nakagawa, 41 steps
- for my grandfather, who gave me the paper
- for Jiichan and Obaachan. he counted. she remembers the number
the last one. I think. ask Hana.
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Facts
| First name | Tadashi |
|---|---|
| Last name | Nakagawa |
| Nickname | Jiichan |
| Comments | died Feb 9 2025. not deleting this |
People
Theo Nakagawa-ReedJiichan is grandparent of Theo Nakagawa-Reed
Appears with
People linked to the same records.
Mom · 1 record Dad · 1 record Hana Nakagawa-Reed · 1 record Obaachan · 1 record Aunt Colleen · 1 record Miso · 1 record Dez · 1 record Priya · 1 record Jonah · 1 record Sam Haddad · 1 record Lu · 1 record Kofi · 1 recordQuestions
4
Questions whose supporting records include Jiichan or a record linked to them.
q001 what's my SSN q013 what address is printed on my license q014 I'm filling out the rental application for the Finchley place. Pull together what they'll ask for: full legal name, date of birth, where I've lived the last five years with dates, my current landlord and her phone, what I pay in rent, employer and income, my car, references and an emergency contact. q028 how many radiators do I have