Settling In Gently by R.A.Davis

First, let me say, I don't know anything. Go ahead and read my know-nothing thoughts, you've been warned. The thing with ceremony is, it doesn't happen in normal time. You cross a border into another world. It's not benign, it's not easy. You need help. There's a reason fairy tales are populated with helpers, with wise old guides in guises. You can't go it alone, you can't muddle through safely. You need to walk with someone. Ceremony is personal. It's happening in the outside world, of course. It's happening in the world of dirt and fire and dust and sweat. But it's really happening inside your own na'au, your own gut, the seat of your spirit. Although an observer can describe or name or categorize or claim ownership of the outer stuff, what happens in your own brain and guts and whatever that bloody breakable organ that houses love is-- that's entirely your own. When I'm close to ceremony, I can't talk about it becau...

When I made this blog about 8 years ago, I was living in a one-room ohana apartment attached to a farmhouse on Hawaiian Homelands in Waimea, Big Island. I was thinking hard-- learning hard-- trying to understand the things I saw-- the dusty thorny beaches studded with hidden black petroglyphs in the shadow of a walled resort where you could pet pink dolphins. I was trying to figure out my place in a culture that defined me differently than I had ever been defined. Later I learned the word for that-- as a white girl in American, my whiteness had never been a marker. I was marked by other things, but never race or culture. In Hawaii, I was able to perceive for the first time the existence of my whiteness, and my fluency in white American culture. This is an ungainly process-- and the reason so many white Americans kind of freak out when they move to Hawaii-- something they didn't even know about themselves is in fact a thing that defines them-- every thing they do, and how they perce...

Today us the kind of day that shortens my life by five years; that parches my skin and carves the jagged lines around my eyebrows and mouth deeper into a scowl; that makes me want to escape or run or fight. Or write. So right or wrong, I need to write it out. Yesterday I read the Ramayana to my students. I have a short graphic novel version, and the kids got all swept up the the grand drama of princes, princesses, gods, goddesses, demons, gurus, bears, and monkeys. They imagined how they would retell the epic Hawaiian myths in their own styles and sketched Hawaiian gods and goddesses in sarongs and swim shorts, with Disney princess faces as they listened. And today I loaded them up into two school vans and took everybody-- all of the secondary teachers and students-- up to the Hindu temple and monastery in Wailua. I was impressed-- every kid followed my instructions to bring their permission slips and wear modest pants or skirts. I quizzed them in the van-- Rama and Sita, Jambavan and ...

Today I got to accompany my 7th-12th graders to a heiau restoration project. In the discussion amongst us teachers leading up to this excursion, we were warned that "he wahe kane." It's a man place, a makahiki games sight. I didn't know what to expect As I picked up my walkie-talkie from the front office, the Hawaiian language teacher pulled me to the side with something like: "I na aia ia oe ka wailehua, a'ale pono e komo i ka heiau." I didn't understand-- he had to rephrase. "Ka waihooluu no ka lehua? Ka wai ulaula?" Ah. I finally got it. "Ma'i?" I answered. Monosyllabic and agrammitical,  as usual. He was telling me that, if I or the other women were on our periods, we were supposed to wait and not enter the heiau grounds.  The colorful idiom is "the water of the lehua blossom." Much more poetic than "auntie flow." We piled all of the non-menstruating students (luckily all of them) into the vans and ...

Today at school, a 14 year old kid careened into his seat next to me, and announced non sequitur that his mom said that if he ever "turned gay," she would beat the gay out of him. "So," he said, "That's it, I can never be gay! Nope, straight forever!" Another boy chimed in and said his mom said the same. He acted it out: "Hey mom, I'm gay." "Oh yeah?? CRACK!!!" And he mimed a backhand across his imaginary face. I wish classrooms came equipped with pause buttons. In my still-frame classroom, I would have liked to consider the audience-- these are middle schoolers who still used "gay" as an insult until I made them stop, and so now they've switched to "retarded." I'm still working on that one... I would like to have stopped, looked up the relevant legal issues. Hawaii public schools don't offer sex ed; am I even allowed to talk about issues relating to human sexuality? My informal policy h...

Listening to Pandora, an angry 90's girl mix, Sheryl Crow is singing, "if it makes you happy it can't be that bad. If it makes you happy, then why the hell are you so sad." I realize that my inner teenage mormon-girl is sadly shaking her head-- if you are unhappy it MUST be bad! Although as an adult I believe that  happy lives can look very different from each other, that being good can be miserable, and that breaking the rules can be right, I still sometimes get pings from my inner zealot. But I suddenly realize that Mormonism, our values of abstinence, cleanliness, and self-improvement aren't special. This is a shock: we are the peculiar people! We are the exclusive heirs of the restored truth-- whatever else is good in the world is incomplete if it doesn't include Mormon temples, Mormon priesthood. When we present our ideas to other people, we must speak slowly and carefully because "the World" just won't have ears to hear our special langua...

I had an experience the other day that reminded me how malleable reality is. Matt got me a special Ayurvedic Massage for Valentines day. I went into the little north-shore plantation cottage with an open mind. Beautiful solid-wood furniture, lavishly illustrated coffee table books about Hindu art and the basics of Ayurveda, heavy brain-softening incense smoking on burners in every corner. Two sundamaged white ladies showed me the massage table, the sauna box, the shower, then handed me a paper loin cloth with a hemp string and said, "meet us at the massage table, wearing only that." The table was like a butcher block: solid wood, slick with oil and fragrant, with a gutter all around. The need for the gutter became apparent. The ladies had me lie on my back, and they did a little pre-massage yogic warm-up. And here is where I felt a mental switch get flipped. The inner cynic smirked. I squinted at these two aging hippies saluting the sun and bowing to each other. But then, s...

This morning we took a short trek up to Lawai to visit the International Peace Center's openhouse. It was so clear and bright that all the heavy cloud leis were gone from the mountains, and we could see their green rumpled skirts all around us. It's easy to forget to see them-- everything was bright today. The center is back in a little residential neighborhood. A flock of pretty goats graze the grass out front, and a cheerful greeter in a straw hat and designer sandals showed us to some lawn chairs with a serene view and gave us some jasmine tea and Manju--Japanese pastries. We joked under our breath that the red dot on top was the mind altering drugs. Our greeter said to sit and enjoy the peaceful surroundings for a moment while the previous tour finished up the orientation. The view from our lawnchairs was lovely--a long grassy mound in front of an imposing rock wall. Matt wondered, "oh no, the site of a heiau?" Sure enough, yes. A particularly powerful one, in th...