Yipes!
Last night I stepped into the garage and encountered something I would never have seen in Hawaii.
There against the wall stretched as though sun bathing on the beach lie a snake, black as fresh asphalt, with a brilliant yellow broken passing line painted on his back. He had no rattles, but his tail was was doing a rattle dance. That freaked me.
I yelled to DD and HD to come see what we had in our garage. DD beat feet out of there, while my mighty hunter husband gently swept the snake out the garage door, across the driveway and into the bushes. I picked up two juvenile mice we had also swept out of their nest, and deposited them into the bushes. Don’t know if I was feeding the snake or what, but all were released into the wild, and into their destiny.
Meanwhile back on the Big island of Hawaii—I assume it is still there even though we aren’t. I spoke with a neighbor and she answered the phone, so I guess the island is still holding her up.
My daughters and I have that same feeling about Venice Italy, we wonder if it exists when we aren’t there to see it. It seems strange when places are a memory, and already Hawaii sits in the back of my mind.
I do have a message for The Hot Dog Guy:
Hey hot Dog Guy!
Nobody makes hot dogs like you do.
Hot dog Guy was an import was Alaska as are his raindeer hot dogs. At first I wouldn’t eat one. It was a moral issue, like eating Rudolf’s cousin or something. Then HDG gave me a sample of the meat, and I decided—you know how we can justify things—that since these reindeer were farm raised, and since no one went into the wilds to shoot them, it was okay to eat one. If you find a better wiener, tell me.
Driving from our farm in the country to the little town of Pahoa we would stop by the fork in the road where The Hot Dog guy set up the cleanest, most well stocked—sauerkraut, mustard, ketchup, onions, jalapenos—hot dog cart in the world. For $5.00 you could get a hot dog (beef) a soda or juice or water, and a bag of chips. The reindeer dog was, I don’t know, $6 I think.
When he wasn't there we missed him even if we didn't want a hot dog. It was a meeting place, a chat room in the wilds. On rainy days he set up a canopy over the cart. He said when he came here he had a terrible hot dog at the beach, and decided he could do better. And so he did. Don't you love it when people have an idea and do it?
Hawaii from memory:
At the Merrie Monarch Festival parking lot, a big burly middle aged Hawaiian, biceps the size of whiskey kegs, delicately held a towel forming a cabana between the car door and his body while his diminutive lady of about the same age changed into her Hawaiian dress.
One must purchase a Merrie Monarch ticket about a year in advance to attend the hula competition. We attended the art faire though. The art was expensive and exquisite, the atmosphere rather non-festive. We were surprised; it was a festival after all. The day was dreary so perhaps that added to the lack-luster of it. I mentioned to Mrs. Chiropractor that I expected a festival to be festive, she said, “The Hawaiians take their hula very seriously.”
I was naïve’ then. As I mentioned in the last blog the hula is more than entertainment. It is spiritual.
There were times when DD and I reined in our outrageousness, for fear of offending. One did learn who was approachable and who wasn’t. I guess that is what children do, and adults, too, for that matter. We notice the reception we are getting and adjust our behavior accordingly. If one lives under restrictive conditions, however, they learn to be hesitant and self-conscious. We didn’t want that for ourselves and our sweet baby. Hawaiians do love their keikis (children) though. It is great to see.
We met a couple we met at the Laundromat, he Hawaiian, she Caucasian, who had newborn twin babies, two of four children. He was a large man, robust, who held a tiny baby in the crook of each arm. They just rocked, quiet as lambs, on his massive stomach while his wife did the laundry. She told us her birth story and how they had to fly to Honolulu because the babies were so small. Then she added, “We never wish there were less of them, just more of us.
One day as DD and I were parked across from Cash and Carry, DD was feeding BD, so I felt I couldn't run away immediately, we saw a scene that made us cringe. A pickup truck holding a wire cage enclosing about five dogs also held a dead pig strapped above the dog’s heads.
One night coming home on our jungle road, we encountered a dark truck in the middle of the road. I waited, not wanting to approach a dark vehicle. Oh no, squealing, a little sound. Soon a young man came to the truck carrying a squealing football sized piglet over his head. “You aren’t going to kill our pigs are you?” I asked.
“I’m going to take it home and raise it. “
“How did you find it?” I asked.
“The dogs did.”
Rats.
One might wonder about the call to Hawaii. Everyone knows of Hawaii, has been there, or wants to. I’ve heard that if you ask people where they would want to spend their vacation, most people say “Hawaii.” It is a dream, a romance, a vision out of the blue sitting in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.
Hawaii conger’s up visions of a quiet life, of sipping Mai Tai’s on the beach, of beachcombing, of surfing and snorkeling. One has to agree that the water there is the best. A place where you can walk into the warm water, swim, and walk out without reaching for a towel and feel perfectly comfortable. It is multidimentional, like life.
