unbloggable

I don't know why I'm hung up lamenting time "wasted" or not well enough spent when we're not scurrying all over this island getting sunburned. It's not logical. Staying close to home base and eschewing excursions keeps us out of the car, out of the tedious island traffic; all that time usually spent looking at the road and the tailpipes gets spent looking at the sea and the sky. We save money on gas and bar drinks. The hours patio lounging and napping under billowy curtains are the same as all the hours in past years sitting on the smoking bench gabbing. We just had quiet this time instead of social, resting instead of running, using this respite to be more inside our life than outside. But the doors are all flung open here and the barrier between in and out is a thin one, so by Monday I made a peace with this alternative kind of time.

There are things that can not be reconciled, though, nor blogged. Physical and emotional pain that followed us into the middle of the ocean. Distance, discordance, a darkness versus light battle in which the refractions of light render it villainous. We had no melodious sunrise alarms, no exultant sunset selfies. From the second day we were here, the last day loomed, the endings got all the attention. On the way, a few glimpses in word capture:   

A Monday stroll through the drizzly Koloa farmers market, filling the beach bag with soft sweet little mangos and avocados. A long afternoon twirling in the bathwater of the barely occupied pool. Phil felt his best here, performing aquatic handstands and experimenting with his waterproof camera, while I devoured many chapters of my last sabbatical book.

Finally a whale sighting Tuesday afternoon from the patio lounge. I saw the spout and remembered how different a spout looks from a white cap, and grabbed the binoculars. We heard that the whales arrived late this year, and are leaving early. I'm sure that has nothing to do with so-called climate change.

Tuesday night a spectacular luau at Kilohana Plantation. First we wandered the plantation house where each old room was a gallery nook of jewelry, shells or watercolors. Then we checked in and were seated at a perfectly situated perimeter table with the Joneses, a fun Orlando family of six whose patriarch was a history teacher at Phil's high school. The mai tais were strong, and the food was the best I've had at a luau. Before the show began, couples were called to the stage to sway through the Hawaiian wedding song, and when Mrs. Jones nudged Mr. Jones up there, Phil and I followed them. Then the lights went down and the history of Hawaii unfolded through hula and fire -- the fire eater was certainly stunning but to me, its those hula hips, adorned with white flower wreaths to accent their sublime swirls, that most magically light up the night. It was a performance in the round and the staging took everyone's breath away; the proud all-Kauai cast did not seem to be acting or doing a job, but rather passionately embodying the spirits of their island birthright.      

Wednesday morning a bit of the upper Mahalepu trail and discovering the Makauwaki Cave Reserve. This was an oasis gem that we'd never known about, where a peppy northeastern transplant guide walked us through the flora, fauna and legend that made it "the coolest cave you've ever seen." Across a wooden bridge built for a Pirates of the Caribbean stunt was a replanting garden, where we tramped through the undergrowth looking for the 20 tortoises we were told tended the crops -- we found four of them, the only turtles we'd walked next to on this island, scratched their shells and considered it a success. These novelties of the week, the anchoring specs of glitter this time, are nearly sacred to me now.

This guy staked a claim to our porch for a few days and looked familiar. When had he been on which porch with me before? Could a feral cat live out here for four years, for fourteen years? He's disappeared now; perhaps he'll return next week.