Enjoying a Grandchild

Joseph's choice of activity for the day was to share the Bishop Museum with his dad. Dad thought he was going to get culture. He got some of that, but he also got a lot of hands-on science along the way.

Science at the Bishop Museum has a somewhat different focus than similar facilities on the mainland. Here, the focus is on indigenous plants and animals, volcanoes and their products, and waves. The 3-story model volcano contains exhibits of volcanic products, periodically belches steam/smoke, and houses at its lowest level the Hot Spot where they tell you about how the various volcanic products are produced -- and then pour molten rock from a 2700 degree F furnace onto a sheet of heavy metal to show what lava looks like right of nature's own hot spot, the magma pool deep under a volcanic area. There are several displays about waves -- waves around the islands; what wind makes b-i-g waves where I am; and demonstrations of several mechanisms creating waves.

At the planetarium we sat back and watched the stars visible tonight over Hawaii. We found Orion the Hunter trying to reach the Pleiades, those seven young sisters riding on the shoulder of Taurus the Bull. Behind Orion we saw Leo the Lion, Scorpio (whom the Hawaiians described as a fish hook), and the Gemini twins Castor and Pollux. We saw the planets Saturn, Mercury and Jupiter rising in the early morning sky, with the sun close behind them. We even saw the Southern Cross, not far above the horizon.

We enjoyed the animation exhibit sponsored by the Cartoon Network and on loan from the Museum of Science and Industry in Portland, Oregon, as well as the displays currently open in the still-being-refurbished Hawaii Hall. The main display area with most of the Hawaiian exhibits will not reopen until later this year. In the photo at the top of this screen, Joseph is working at the station about computer-animated images of events we cannot photograph -- in this case, the arrival of a robotic vehicle on Mars. Maybe it's my own video production experience, but I found this exhibit much more interesting than the one on sharks that occupied the space last winter.

By 2:00 (we had arrived at 9:30 a.m.) we were all ready to move on. I headed over to see my dad and pick up his dirty laundry. By 4:00 this grandma was glad to be home and able to put her feet up.

Nancy Ruth, Joe and Joseph headed for the Elks Club and some beach time. Nancy called later. Joseph had found a playmate. Sunset Beach has its fame, but is a destination unto itself. It doesn't have all the things that Waikiki offers to keep 9-year-old boys entertained. Tomorrow they are moving to town.

Give thanks for your family, however it has grown. Give thanks for grandchildren -- God's promise that the world will go on. Don't forget to pray.

A Day at the Beach

Yesterday I drove 100 miles. On Oahu. Which has only 112 miles of coastline. More or less. I guess I should have just continued in the direction I was going, instead of back-tracking the way I had come. We think nothing of driving 100 miles when you can easily travel 1000 by car. But the perspective changes when your land mass is 604 square miles of rock in the middle of an ocean. Yosemite National Park is bigger than the island of Oahu. So is the Great Smoky Mountain National Park.

The object of all this driving was to visit hanai daughter Nancy Ruth and her family who are spending the week with hubby Joe's sister and her significant other at their newly purchased home at Sunset Beach. It's a relatively new home on the water in a small gated community at the Kahuku end of town. Joseph had a surfing lesson in the morning, was apparently scared when dumped off his board, and is fighting a cold -- so disappeared to bed and was conspicuous by his absence. Joe went off with his sister to Pearl City. Dana was looking for shelving, Joe for a pair of binoculars big enough to allow him to watch both whales and surfers. Nancy Ruth and I watched the whales, visited, had a light lunch, visited, walked the beach, visited more. When the rains came, we went inside. It was good for me. I hope it was as good for her.

The beach was not quite like the photo above. The day was more overcast, lacking the brilliant hues of ocean, mountains, sky and vegetation. Kaena Point was partially obscured by mist, perhaps a misty rain. The waves were generally flatter. But the air was mild, the occasional sprinkles not disruptive, and the ocean calming. We watched whale spouts and splashes instead of big surf. It was quiet, calming, restorative.

Nancy is master of understatement. "There is a construction person here." she told me on the phone. "They had a little water damage that needed repair." The "little water damage" turned out to be 2.5 feet of water throughout the main floor, with accompanying mold and fungus growth, after the water heater failed. While they were ripping out drywall, Dana and Kario also replaced two small windows with sliding glass doors and re-designed a closet, making the main floor feel more expansive. Now they are painting, considering new flooring and entire kitchen remodel. I wonder if thinking green(as in preserve and recyle) is part of their head set.

The message that I would be visiting did not get to Kario. He was taken quite by surprise when he answered my knock at the door, and nearly had me packed off and heading back to town before Nancy saw me and called out. She later commented that Kario and Dana found evidence that at least one well-known young member of the surfer community had been squatting in their home during their absence, leaving behind identifying information. Did I look like a squatter? I suppose my "Keep the Country COUNTRY" t-shirt didn't do much to endear me to Kario who appreciates, perhaps covets, exactly the kind of property that the Defend Oahu Coalition opposes. I suggested a local property manager would be a good insurance policy, both for incidents like the water heater and as a protection against squatters.

Give thanks for the ocean and quiet days. Look for shafts of sunlight between the darker clouds. Don't forget to pray. Oh yes, give thanks for my brother Ian who has unknowingly provided the sun-in-clouds photo, above ...

To the Mothers of 9-Year-Olds

At least two of you out there are parents of 9-year-olds. As I was raking leaves this morning a thought struck me. Just yesterday those 9-year-olds were new babies. Wasn't it this morning that they were learning to walk, to ride a bike, tie shoe laces, and heading off to kindergarten? High school graduation is a million years in the future. Right along there with the driver's license and college tuition.

Here's the bad news. By the time those wonderful 9-year-old children turn 18, they will be champing at the bit to be somewhere else. Anywhere else. How did you feel at 18? Yes, at least one of you wished at 18 that she had parents to go home to. At least one of you might have enjoyed a more traditional nuclear family. At least one of you was pushing out into new frontiers of independence. Ray and I used to laugh together and say that God gives us teen-agers so that when it is time for our children to leave home, we breathe a huge sign of relief and say, "GO!" Oh, we still love you. Nothing can change that. We want you to come home regularly, to keep in touch, to tell us how you feel and what you are thinking about. But we don't want you hanging about the house as irresponsible adults, either. So we teach our children to be independent, to think for themselves, to take responsibility for their actions, and to challenge those ideas, beliefs and practices they believe are unjust. Then we sputter and spit and shed a tear or two when they do just that! You will, too.

Consider. Nine is half of 18. If you have 9-year-olds, they are already half-way out your door. Cherish them. Guide them. Bribe them and compromise with them. Teach them about the logical consequences (positive and negative) of their behavior. What other important lessons do they need to learn in their second 9 years of life? Will they be as ready as they think they are? Never. As ready as they need to be? Perhaps. Missed at home? Always.

The other day I heard a radio piece about a mother in the southern US who allowed her 10-year-old son to walk -- alone -- to baseball practice. Son begged and pleaded to be allowed this privilege. Parents had taken all the proper precautions at home. He knew the way, had walked it several times with family. He knew not to get into a car with strangers. He had a cell phone with him. Mom would run one errand and arrive at the ball field about 15 minutes after the start of practice. I don't remember if they had told the coach he was walking alone. Several adults saw him en route. They called the police, who responded and drove the child to the ball field. Mother, when she arrived, was thoroughly chastised and accused of child endangerment. Who were the responsible adults in this case? The parents, who allowed their son to exercise a bit of independence? Those who called the police? The police? I don't know. I tend to support the parents.

Never again will a 3-year-old and a 7-year-old get on a bus together, ride to the end of the line, go to the zoo, and then catch a bus home. Too bad. I have fond memories of those trips. My brother and I did it more than once.

Give thanks for children -- ours and those who touch our lives. Don't forget to pray!

Kimo's Day

Thirty-nine years ago yesterday I was on staff at an Episcopal church in Palo Alto, California. I went to work that Sunday morning with my week-old son -- dressed in rosebuds and pink lace. We had picked him up the day before at Los Angeles Airport. With less than a week's notice that a new baby boy was joining our family, there was lots to be done. Clean up the crib. Find the sheets and blankets. Round up the essential new baby paraphernalia like diapers, diaper pins and bottles. Where was the baby carrier? No home-from-the-hospital carseats in those days! I think we were also at the end of the diaper pin era. We had to buy airline tickets and find a hotel room in Los Angeles where we were to meet a plane from Hawaii. We would meet a doctor we had never seen before, but who we would recognize by the newborn he was delivering from Hawaii. There wasn't any time left over for finding a little boy wardrobe.

Today that little boy is an adult, a proud dad himself, and wouldn't be caught dead in pink, let alone rosebuds and lace. I honor his biological mother by allowing her to celebrate the weekend of his birth. This weekend belongs to our family.

Give thanks for Kimo, for his wife Lu, and for their daughters Brianna, Kianna and Kayla. Also for Lu's other children -- George, Gabriel and Veronica. Don't forget to pray!

Aloha, Verna

My friend Verna passed away at 2:12 p.m. today California time. She was 86. Verna is the lady who lived with me for several weeks last summer when she left the hospital after wrecking her car in Sonora. She was vibrant and unconventional right up to the end. (photo, left: Verna (Silver) Nosker with brothers Dick and Bob Silver and their mother Mary (Bogan) Silver circa 1983)

Verna was from two old Tuolumne County families. Her father was a Silver, one of 24 (yes, you read that correctly) children born to Francis and Julia (Salvador) Silver of Shaws Flat. Her mother was a Bogan from Stent, eldest of nine children of James Bogan of Stent and his Chiliean wife Hannah (also called Faviana) dela Cruz Fuentes of Montezuma. About this time of year there's a wonderful display of daffodils under an old oak tree in a horse pasture just southerly of the Cal-Trans yard on Montezuma Road. That's where, said Verna, Mary (Bogan)Silver's Chilean grandmother lived when Mary was a little girl, where the children went to visit and learn Spanish. Although she was born in Stockton and lived very little of the first 40 or so years of her life in Tuolumne Co., Verna always considered herself local. You could bet that she'd tell every waitress, every nurse, every service person she met in the county, "I'm an old timer, honey. I'm an old timer." She was not referring to her age. Only in the last year had Verna begun to think of herself as getting old.

Verna was passionate about young people. She returned to Tuolumne Co. in the 1960's to provide services for children and teens through the mental health program. She was heavily involved in programs combating substance abuse among teens. She later provided counseling in the public schools especially in the outlying communities. The kids called her "the lady with the knot on her head" because she wore her long hair tightly wrapped into a bun on the very top of her head. Ray and I met her through the mental health services she provided in Groveland, and became close friends. When she retired in the 1980's we collected her mail from Jamestown and held it until she arrived somewhere within a 100 mile radius, then delivered it. She and her parrot, a Yellow-Naped Amazon named Goldie (after a cousin, Golden Silver), criss-crossed the western US in a 24-foot motor home, visiting friends and family where ever they happened to be. Two or three times a year she'd spend a couple of weeks in our driveway before moving up to Yosemite Lakes RV park, down to Turtle Beach RV park in Manteca, over to the KOA park between Stockton and Lodi, or one of her other favorite haunts.

Verna was loud, outspoken, and stubborn. She had a unique style. One day she spilled paint on a new pair of khakis. Throw them away? Never! Verna found a brush and daubed red, green, yellow, blue and orange paint all over those pants. Then she painted a couple of pairs of white tennis shoes for good measure. She found causes and hung onto them. She warned seniors about mail fraud (as she regularly returned her Publishers Clearing House Sweepstakes entries), boycotted Wal-Mart after they refused to accept any liability when she was injured by another customer in a motorized shopping cart, and daily reminded me, "You have to take care of yourself, honey." She was ecstatic when her children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren and great-great-grandchildren came to visit or sent photos. Like all moms, she fretted when she didn't hear from them "enough". We never near from our children "enough".

Give thanks for Verna's life. Give thanks that she did not suffer excessively from her cancer. Pray for her family. Be at peace, my friend.

Getting Back on Track

It has been two years. I finally went back to church. Chose the same church I grew up in, where I was confirmed, where I spent half my life in junior high and high school. That was a l-o-n-g time ago! The church is a little different. There Is stained glass(free-form color design rather than drawn images) in the long windows on the east wall behind the altar; once those were clear louvers. The massive marble cross suspended above the altar is draped in purple for Lent. I don't remember what color the carpet used to be, but clearly what is there now is less than 50 years old! But the altar is still where it was placed in 1954, although the communion rail has been modified to bend around the altar rather than to separate it from the congregation. Thankfully, no one has tried to shape the graceful facility into a church-in-the-round -- something for which it was never intended.

What were once the church offices have become Sunday School space, and the offices have moved across the street to what we once called the Youth Center. I don't know what they call it now. The congregation is much smaller (we used to fill the church) and much older -- very few under retirement age. Once upon a time we could gather 30 or 40 teens for a youth group meeting, 50 or more for weekly worship.

Ooops. Started this post a couple of evenings ago, then got sidetracked and forgot it needed to be finished.

It felt good to be back in the familiarity of the liturgy, albeit with not-quite-familiar service music and two pieces sung in Hawaiian. Nobody was doing that even 40 years ago. I realized just how "high church" I have become after more than 30 years in the Diocese of San Joaquin. There, it's difficult to tell the difference between an Episcopal church (if you can still find one) and a Roman Catholic church. No room for Stations of the Cross and other high church acoutrements at Holy Nativity -- the side "walls" are all glass doors that can be open or shut as the weather demands. The only bell is the one that calls us to worship before the processional hymn. The acolytes wear waist-length cottas over their shorts, t-shirts and bare feet. The women of the choir could add the appropriate lei and be in full Daughters of Hawaii regalia -- long white muumuu, white sandals. Chalice bearers and readers do not vest. The priest wears sandals under his alb and forgoes the cincture. Nothing is disrespectful, just adapting to local conditions.

This was the first step. The Church has been an anchor most of my life, and this particular church laid the foundation. Will it once again become my church home? We'll see.

Give thanks for the people of Holy Nativity who reach out into their community. Don't forget to pray.

Taking Chances

The other day I wrote about having the courage to step out and do something really different. Yesterday turned out to be one of those days.

It started out simply enough. I went to the hairdresser. I am currently "seeing" a young man named Jake, a student at the Paul Mitchell School in nearby Kaimuku. Jake had cut my hair several weeks ago, cut it shorter than I really liked (but cut exactly what I asked for), so we were learning together about making adjustments. He spent a lot of time asking what I was looking for in a hair style. I want to be able to go out in the wind and come in looking maybe a little windblown, but not a complete disaster. Been having trouble with that in Hawaii. So he thought, and he trimmed, and he shaped, and I could see the wheels turning. Eventually he asked about a "deep conditioning" treatment to soften up some of the frizzies that natural curls acquire in humid environments. Then he added, "with a little temporary color".

I balked. I argued with myself. After all, I've gone this far in life without coloring my hair. Why start now? Then I though about that bulldozer, and new directions. Offered the thought that Sarah would opt for burgandy. Jake thought that was a great plan. The compromise? When I look in the mirror, I see almost a dark blonde. Blonde????? What do you see? It's really all the same color. We have to make allowances for the webcam and its limitations.

Interestingly, at the hospital yesterday afternoon several people commented that I look different. Universally, they saw only the style (straight) -- not the color change. Once I style this cut myself it will likely look different. We shall see. Meanwhile, the students cut and style into what they are taught, encouraged to learn the basics before they begin to improvise. Good plan!

Find something positive about today. Give thanks. Don't forget to pray!