I'm sitting on Aupaka Terrace, where coffee and "grab and go" (ridiculously overpriced) breakfast is served, overlooking the pool and beach. Families on spring break pass by loaded down with pool toys, snorkel gear, backpacks, and towels. Retired folk amble along often gathering in groups at large tables sharing coffee and conversation, no particular place they need or want to be but right here. Company employees (this week a group from Google!), dressed in Aloha shirts and sundresses, smile and chat with cell phones in their hands and notebooks tucked under their arms. Every single head swivels towards this view. How can we not look and feel so incredibly grateful for our good fortune?
OOOPPPPS! Not everyone is feeling grateful. There is a family of four (husband, wife, two middle school-ish aged kiddos) sitting near me and the wife is having an absolute hissy fit! Teeth clenched, arms waving, voice raised (but I can't make out the words) aiming wrath at her husband who sits slumped, taking it in silence, even when she moves in about 6 inches from his face with a final diatribe. The daughter sits still as stone, staring outward, the son hunches over a crossword puzzle, not looking up. They've obviously seen this all before. Such scenes of family strife always make me sad. My empath goes into hyper-mode and I want to walk over there and save everyone. But I sit here typing away, trying to tamp down my God Complex. I can't save them. Mom and daughter have walked away. Dad and son sit silently, reading and writing, not talking, not looking up. And it's only 9:30 a.m. Long day ahead, methinks.
Hub is out for his morning walk. I always have good intentions of joining him, but this terrace calls me. I love the people watching (even if sometimes I have to witness what I just did) and I love the pool view and I love the proximity to the coffee bar and I love that WiFi that allows me to open my computer and scroll through my emails, my FB newsfeed, and my blog. When he returns we'll head back up to our condo unit for breakfast, then to our chairs near the beach where we'll read, do the NYT crossword, wander to the pool to cool off or hop in the surf (more Hub's thing than mine if there are some good boogie boarding waves). We may go up again later for lunch, then back down for more of the same until about 5:00 when we pack it in for the day; time to shower, prepare our fish for grilling, eat dinner and switch on the TV or open another book until we get sleepy. It's a rough life.
Sometimes, even though I love it here, I am ambivalent about coming. I have to endure flying for one thing, which I've well-documented previously how much I hate. This time we fought, according to the flight crew, the strongest headwinds they'd ever experienced causing our flight to take nearly 7 hours from Seattle, some of it in "choppy" skies. I tried not to think about that deep blue enormous Pacific Ocean below us. I took extra Dramamine, so I was in a drug-induced state of "calm" mostly but still had to meditate and breathe my way out of panic a couple of times. Also a young couple with a 20 month old son were my seat mates. In fact the whole plane seemed to be full of toddlers. Always such happy fliers, they. HaHa
But this time I wasn't ambivalent; I was eager to be here. Our NW winter/spring has been an interminable marathon of gray skies and rain. I was starting to wonder if the sun still shone. (It does!) Plus, the political landscape since November has kept me under a dark emotional cloud too. I felt I needed this respite as a reset. My intention is to find my center again; to get focused, balanced, and reinvigorated about life. I'll keep you posted.
OMG. Dad and son just got up from their chairs, exchanged a few words, and Dad reached over and pulled his son (a gangly 14 y/o, I'd say) toward him and gave him a kiss on the side of his head, which I thought was a particularly sweet gesture, given and received between males in public. The boy smiled and they walked away together. Saving each other, without me.
At least, that's the view from here....©
