interview with 3NEWS\u2019 Lidia Herrera last May<\/a>, Mathis spoke openly about his diagnosis and his mindset as he faced it.<\/p>\n\u201cWhen I started focusing on my behavior, I started becoming a better person,\u201d Mathis said.<\/p>\n
Mathis, before serving as community mascot, was in the United States Army and served in Vietnam, according to Trevino. As expected, the veterans chipped in to help Pete raise funds for Ronnie.<\/p>\n
“VFW was one of my largest sponsors,” Trevino said. “They help tremendously.”<\/p>\n
In June, Trevino told 3NEWS that Ronnie underestimates the impact he’s had on the community and relayed a story of a friend who’d run into Ronnie on a particularly rough day, during which he was contemplating suicide. That man ran into Ronnie, who told him he was loved. The man decided not to kill himself. He later told Trevino that Ronnie saved his life that day.<\/p>\n
“He doesn’t realize what he means to the city,” Trevino said. “He doesn’t believe it. Just like Selena, they’re going to continue to know Ronnie as Mr. Corpus Christi. He is everything that Corpus stands for — a representative of every person, culture, and gender. He doesn’t judge. He loves to see people smile.”<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s in a better place now\u2026 and his code of love and friendship will forever be etched in my heart,\u201d Trevino said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ronnie \u201cPointy Boots\u201d Mathis has died after a cancer battle, according to friend Pete Trevino. ‘My best friend…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":211889,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[155,157,156],"class_list":["post-211888","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-corpus-christi","tag-corpus-christi","tag-corpus-christi-headlines","tag-corpus-christi-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/211888","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=211888"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/211888\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/211889"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=211888"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=211888"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=211888"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}