Years
I just realized that it's been four years this month since I moved to Hawaii. And-- notice the long silence since my last post?
There's a couple of reasons (excuses) for that.
Life is busy-- I just had a new baby, my older kid stopped napping, and my full-time gig as a kid-chaser has become more brain consuming. Maybe I just don't have time.
But there's another reason why I don't have much to say on this blog. I started it up as a way to salve the growing pains I experienced from transplanting here. My hackles were up-- listening for slurs against me and against my new home. And I had that clear-eyed view of things that tourists and newcomers have: this compared with that, home vs. away. I laugh to see the line of tourist cars pulled helter skelter off the road, taking pictures of weedy flowers and branchy trees-- stuff that they have at home but that they never SEE. When you're traveling, touring, or transplanting-- the strangeness and beauty of things come into sharp focus.
I've settled into a life here-- I have my small and permeable circle of friends. I have my routines-- where I shop, where I take my kid to the beach, where we go for ice cream. And the periphery is getting comfortably blurred. Are there issues swirling? Yes-- enormous construction projects are left like empty eye-sockets, I-beams exposed and tarps flapping over the expensively manicured grounds. Reinstated Hawaiian government license plates are proliferating. Long-time haole residents say shockingly ignorant things, Micronesians live invisibly, trimming, bussing, tending, supporting. People marry on the beach with sandy rose-petals or in the church gym with baby-bump flattering dresses. The Buddhists congregate, sing hymns, share green tea. The Lutherans meet, sing hymns and share coffee.
The whole island is full of communities and micro communities, dissolving, colliding, recombining like galaxies. But I'm caught up in my own little stellar swirl-- planning dinners, dumping leftovers, wiping noses.
But I'm going to try and keep my eyes open-- notice the world around me, poke my head out of my doughy shell a bit.
I'll be back.
There's a couple of reasons (excuses) for that.
Life is busy-- I just had a new baby, my older kid stopped napping, and my full-time gig as a kid-chaser has become more brain consuming. Maybe I just don't have time.
But there's another reason why I don't have much to say on this blog. I started it up as a way to salve the growing pains I experienced from transplanting here. My hackles were up-- listening for slurs against me and against my new home. And I had that clear-eyed view of things that tourists and newcomers have: this compared with that, home vs. away. I laugh to see the line of tourist cars pulled helter skelter off the road, taking pictures of weedy flowers and branchy trees-- stuff that they have at home but that they never SEE. When you're traveling, touring, or transplanting-- the strangeness and beauty of things come into sharp focus.
I've settled into a life here-- I have my small and permeable circle of friends. I have my routines-- where I shop, where I take my kid to the beach, where we go for ice cream. And the periphery is getting comfortably blurred. Are there issues swirling? Yes-- enormous construction projects are left like empty eye-sockets, I-beams exposed and tarps flapping over the expensively manicured grounds. Reinstated Hawaiian government license plates are proliferating. Long-time haole residents say shockingly ignorant things, Micronesians live invisibly, trimming, bussing, tending, supporting. People marry on the beach with sandy rose-petals or in the church gym with baby-bump flattering dresses. The Buddhists congregate, sing hymns, share green tea. The Lutherans meet, sing hymns and share coffee.
The whole island is full of communities and micro communities, dissolving, colliding, recombining like galaxies. But I'm caught up in my own little stellar swirl-- planning dinners, dumping leftovers, wiping noses.
But I'm going to try and keep my eyes open-- notice the world around me, poke my head out of my doughy shell a bit.
I'll be back.
This is a delicious post. You are right, visitors and newbies anywhere notice the contrasts and feel the injustices or contradictions more sharply. I suppose I can wait for such a settling effect to happen here where I am undergoing a culture shock of my own!
ReplyDeleteGlad you're back -- I missed you. Thanks for writing, even in the midst of wiping noses and chasing kiddos. Take care.
ReplyDelete