*This is my love letter to an island sorely in need. Maui has been ravaged by storms and fire. There are links below on how to help from afar.

Once upon an age ago, an eight-year-old girl was put on an airplane– the first of three–and sent on a journey across the country and halfway across an ocean for a summer that would change her life.

I was that girl. To clarify, my parents weren’t trying to rid themselves of a problem child, sending her halfway around the globe for some peace and quiet.

Okay, they might have.

And they didn’t simply send me blindly. My aunt waited for me on the other end of the journey.

Snooker, as she preferred to be called, had moved to the island of Maui the year I was born. She was the mysterious and kooky person on the other end of a phone line, the breath of island air that wafted through on the occasional holiday, bearing a suitcase full of chocolate covered macadamia nuts, and necklaces of wilted flowers.

A flight attendant shuttled me from gate to gate in LAX, a friend of Snooker’s accompanied me from Honolulu to Kahului.

My aunt met me at the airport laden with more leis than my pre-pubescent neck could bear. She named the exotic flowers–ginger, plumeria, lokelani. My first memory of Maui is the heady sweetness enveloping me like the hugs my family didn’t readily offer.

We drove out of the city, through fields of tall sugar cane that gave way to acres of spiky pineapple plants. The road wound across the island to the slopes of the volcano. Snooker made me practice the name-Haleakala, the House of the Sun.

It was a grand start to my first adventure far from where I called home.

“Do you want to go for a swim?” Snooker asked after she showed me around the house we would share for the summer. She knew the answer. At that point in my life, I was part fish. Although, the plan was for me to learn tennis that summer as well.

Snooker had been a nationally ranked amateur tennis player.

But that first day, my future tennis career suffered a fatal blow. On the way to the pool, cutting through a horse pasture, Snooker stepped in a hole and broke her ankle.

Hindered by a cast that reached her knee, she wondered what to do with a hyper, inquisitive, and yes, bratty, young girl for two months. A young girl who had noticed the residents of that treacherous pasture.

“Can I ride the horses?”

And the rest, they say is history. My first ride took place around one of the pineapple fields that used to blanket the lower slopes of Haleakala. That was all it took. I was infected by the horse disease.

That summer I body surfed in the Pacific Ocean while Snooker sat on her tatami mats, probably cursing the sand that crept under her cast. I hiked into Haleakala with Snooker’s friends, whose children became my friends. We spent the night in a cabin on the crater floor, saw wild Nenes–the rare Hawaiian goose, and blooming Silversword plants–that grow nowhere else in the world.

I got freckles where my nose burned despite layers of zinc oxide. My hair bleached to near white, and my skin browned.

I discovered the best glazed doughnuts in the world from Komoda’s bakery. Went camping in the rain on the Keanae peninsula. Explored the Iao valley and its tall, green needle. Collected flowers on an estate, learned to make leis. I chased crabs on the beach in Kihei. Visited the Big Buddha at the Jodo Mission in Lahaina. Watched the cane burn in the distance. Learned how to pronounce Hawaiian words correctly.

Despite her injury, Snooker allowed me to experience the island she called home. She offered it to me in its entirety, and I loved it entirely in return.

When September came, I didn’t want to leave. When I got home, I dreamed of going back.

But I didn’t until 2007 to celebrate Snooker’s life in memoriam. So much had changed, but not that sense of wonder and love I’d cherished since that summer. I visited again in 2020, just before the pandemic. So many changes, but never my sense of wonder and love for the island.

It was never my home, but always in my heart.

Now, with so much lost, my heart breaks for those who call Maui home. For my ohana of far away, for the island that shaped a huge part of my life.

 mau i koʻu puʻuwai

Maui needs our help, if you can please donate.
Maui Strong – Hawaii Community Foundation https://www.hawaiicommunityfoundation.org/maui-strong

Maui Food Bank — Helping the Hungry in Maui County https://mauifoodbank.org/

Kākoʻo Maui (memberplanet.com)https://www.memberplanet.com/campaign/cnhamembers/kakoomaui

In today’s episode of whattheheckiswrongnow?, we cover how lack of sleep, a lingering cold, and blatant misogyny turn me into a raving lunatic.

Straw One:

I live on a farm; therefore, I own a tractor. Well, two now with the addition of Blue. Welcome Blue! Lovely to have you. And lifesaving really. Because my faithful Kubota of 30 years is having a bit of a moment. Said moment has been on and off for 2 years, but a moment.

This moment consists of intermittent starting. As in, I could go out every day and my orange baby starts up and runs like the champ she is.

OR

Nothing. No lights no nothing. I tighten the connections to the battery, check all fuses, and make sure the pesky wire that runs to the starter hasn’t slipped off again.

OR

I get lights and no crank. Just an unfulfilling little whine from the starter.

Now, let me please, please, please say, I am not a diesel mechanic, nor do I claim to be an expert on combustion engines. And I will always admit that I know enough to get me in trouble. BUT I do know that if it seems like the starter, and it acts like a textbook starter problem, then most likely the problem is the solenoid or the starter.

So, I watched my baby be towed away hopeful for a brand-new part and a working tractor. Especially when the tow guy agreed that it most likely was the starter. I admit, when she came back, she worked fine. Did I check to see what the service people had done? Nope and that’s my bad.

When a week later she returned to her usual will-she-won’t-she-start antics, I was a bit peeved. Even more so when I couldn’t find any evidence that the service people had done anything! A guy came out when I couldn’t be there, informed my husband that they had replaced a ground wire, and the dang thing started right up for him. FML

Apparently, I have been starting my tractor wrong for 30 years? NOT. Because when I went to try the way he suggested which is the way I’ve been doing it, yep, you guessed it, nada. Nichts. Nothing.

This is where the misogyny comes in. Because when I called the service provider, it was made abundantly clear that I had no idea what I was talking about, and it was just lucky that I’d been able to use a tractor for three decades, because I couldn’t possibly know what I was talking about or be right in my diagnosis of the problem.

Here I am weeks later with a broken tractor, looking up a replacement starter for a ’93 Kubota L2350 and preparing to fix the dang thing myself.

Straw Two:

The never-ending cold. Just a normal upper respiratory virus. You know, the old-fashioned kind. The ones you just pushed through and sounded like Mama Fratelli from The Goonies (and if you don’t know who that is or haven’t seen the movie, go watch it. Like now.) for 10 days. My asthmatic lungs take a bit longer to process the phlegm, and I spent a good part of those 10 days hacking, especially at night.

The Final Straw(s):

Thunderstorms, fireworks, and a neurotic dog. When I wasn’t coughing, I was comforting one of my dogs, who destroyed and escaped her crate with a speed that would have made Houdini proud. Did I learn my lesson from last summer? When neither Benadryl nor a Thunder shirt nor the prescription antianxiety gel worked to ease her fear?

Nope. I’d been lulled into a lovely sense of security by the other nine months of the year when she’s a model pup.

Added to the nighttime hacking, sitting on a tile floor trying to comfort a dog who refuses all comfort isn’t fun.

And when I did finally return to my bed, I worried about her hurting herself trying to escape the crate.

Leaving her loose didn’t help. She paced, whined, and barked incessantly no matter where she was, while her son (my other hound) joined in. For moral support of course.

Being a holiday weekend, I couldn’t go to the vet for more pharmaceutical help. Again, my bad. And what holiday? The one that revels in thunder like noise on the only clear nights of the week.

By day 5 I felt like Mommie Dearest ready to go ballistic over hangers. Or crated dogs. Or breathing dogs. Or tractors. Or husbands. Or horses that walked out sound and were three-legged lame 30 seconds later. (Said horse had the equine equivalent of a stubbed toe and was thankfully fine)

To be clear, I feel terrible for my dog. I know she doesn’t understand. I know she is terrified. But Mommy was tired and sick and just wanted to sleep and everyone at the vet clinic deserved their extra day off, but again tired and sick and ready to sleep in the barn.

Add into this lovely mélange of self-pity and aggravation, the younger hound blew an anal sac abscess. Did he give me any indication that he was having problems back there? Nope. Just started licking one night and looking at me with those big gooey eyes to tell me he had a nasty smelling, oozing owie.

Did I mention I occasionally fill-in at a vet clinic? Or that I was a vet assistant for 10 years? Yeah. Humility thy name is pet ownership.

But like a storm, we got through it. New crate, new medications (for both dogs), and a new appreciation for sleep, we made it through the week.

It’s all sunshine and rainbows from here on out.

Right?

Right?

Just came back from breakfast with one of the most impressive women I’ve ever known. (That she’s my son’s age isn’t relevant, except to make me feel like a fossil, but I digress).

Breakfast or walks are something we try to do, but life usually interferes.

We started off with the usual pleasantries and then dove into our latest challenges, but something she said struck me, and helped me feel a bit more connected to a world I’ve been retreating from.

The general energy of her world is off.

As soon as I processed her words a little bell inside went- that’s exactly it!

Lately, I have felt the same. Like I’ve stretched myself too thin. My brain is going at a mile a minute, but I’m stuck.

I’ve been writing and riding, but both endeavors feel flat.

Part of that is disappointment. I’ve had to revisit my goals and how I want to reach my altered targets. With riding, I am lucky enough to have a horse that can do the job I want. Writing is a whole other bag of worms.

Add into that mix a desire to people please, perfectionism, and natural introversion, you get the mess that is my current state.

I’m learning to be good with that.

My bandwidth these days is pretty limited.

Is it the collective subconscious of the world? My own brain chemistry? Karma (the bitch who seems to hate me lately)?

Here’s an example: Went out to dinner because we had nothing in the house, because neither one of us had the motivation to go shopping. Our local place was crowded- hey, Saturday night! There were two spots at the bar. The first was next to one of Dear Husband’s friends. The other was at the end of the bar.

I left Dear Hubby with his friends, thinking he would have someone to talk to and I could exist happily in my anti-social bubble for a few minutes.

I had a really good book loaded on my phone. The bartender is a saint and handed over my wine with a heartfelt “enjoy.”

I opened the browser on my phone.

“Is that your horse? Do you have horses? Can I see pictures?” The guy next to me asked. Not wanting to be rude, I showed him. “Honey, look!” he told his wife, “She has horses!”

Aaannnndddd we were off.

While I appreciate all they went through when they volunteered at an unethical animal rescue- truly, truly, I do. There is nothing worse than someone taking advantage of the kindness of others and hoarding animals in the name of rescuing them.

On any other night, talking to them wouldn’t have decimated me. But that night, I didn’t have it in me. Peopleing is sometimes hard for me. It’s draining. And that night it was siphoning a tank already running on fumes.

However, to get back to my pal Karma…One glance down the bar and I see Dear Hubby, not talking or socializing which he loves to do, but engrossed in his phone!

Yep, Karma isn’t happy with me these days.

Or I could just change my perspective. Leave it to my brilliant friend to hand it to me along with a Belgian waffle on a diner plate. My energy is off.

It might be some sort of cosmic thing having to do with astrology, the wind, barometric pressure, or the collective subconscious of the world. Or it could be I need to recharge mentally and physically. To say no (which I did last night to something I was interested in but would have had to jump through too many hoops to make it happen), to make a list of what I need to do and whittle it down to absolute necessities, to contrast that list with one containing the things I want to do and find the middle ground.

If it means taking a nap or sitting on the back porch alone, trying to ask for what I need instead of feeling less because I can’t give others what they want. I have to allow myself that luxury. Because right now, I’m feeling a bit fragile. And I refuse to break.

I should be used to it by now. After all, my father passed away peacefully on an August afternoon 30 years ago.

My sister and I had been in Texas for over a week. Our mom was upset that we’d come, thinking it was the end. She might have been tough, but she didn’t want to lose her best friend. My mom loved hard, but quietly, shoving it behind bravado and razor tongue.

My dad? He was solid and eternal. He fought hard to live- defying his doctor’s predictions of 6-12 months, then 3-6 months by living 3 years. 3 years of doctors cutting pieces away, of chemo and radiation treatments, 3 years of stubbornly, and quietly hanging on to his dignity and his life.

I could tell so many morbidly funny stories about that time in Texas. Gallows humor is my family’s jam. But that’s not where I am today, so they will wait in the vault until I’m ready to let them go.

My dad wanted to make it to 60, to live longer than his own father. And he did. By 5 measly months.

He’s been gone from my life longer than he was in it.

That fact will never minimize the impact he had on my life, the many lessons he taught (when I chose to hear them), the absolute love he had for his family (when I chose to accept it). He taught me to never judge anyone by appearance or assumptions. He gave me security. His sandwich shop was my home base, my safe space, and a big chunk of my world. He was the affectionate parent, the one not afraid to show love, the one who taught me to hug.

He was far from perfect.

But grief has a way of easing the sharp sting of past mistakes. And even 30 years out, it grabs me on days like today, making me long for just one more chance to tell him what he meant to me.

A lot can change in 30 years. I grew up. My child grew up. He is on the cusp of becoming a father himself. (Yes, all those people who listened to me declare I would never be a grandmother are watching me gleefully eat those words). My nephew has a wonderful family of his own.

I know the chances that he would have lived to 90 were slim, but I wish he were here to watch his grandchildren grow up, know them as adults, to hold his great-grandchildren in his lap and sing to them the silly little song he sung to my child, to my sister’s children.

So much has changed in 30 years.

And yet the longing remains.

Happy Father’s Day, Dad. Wherever you may be.