A very small well of nostalgia has developed somewhere between my throat and ribcage and I hate it. I've noticed in the past week or so that, in going about my day to day, I've been slowing down the sensory process...taking in the details, noting the colors and shapes more carefully. Parts of the daily routine are triggering the most mundane memories from my childhood and I'm starting to acknowledge just how much Kona has changed since we came in 1987. But it's the small stuff that gets me. Like the fact that there used to be a wall in front of Hale Halawai, and now it's just a couple of tree trunks. And the other night I noticed how worn the turn off from Henry Steet to Palani Road is, then remembered the thousands of times we had to go all the way down Palani to get to Queen K, long before Henry Street even existed.

Last night I went out for what will be my last Durty Jake's karaoke Thursday for some time to come. The gruesome twosome, BP and MD came out. Glennon was there too, but only for a few minutes, just long enough to bid a polite farewell.

We got ripshit and a splendid time was had by all (even by Karen, I'm convinced, even though I know she hates going out.) Not only did I drink enough to wiggle about the dancefloor with reckless abandon, I sang three songs: Birdhouse in your Soul, Breakfast at Tiffany's and I am the Walrus. Goo Goo G'joob!

Now anyone who knows me knows that I hate Kona. With venomous pith, no less. I devote an entire part of my brain to this hatred. ("O! Woe is me! What a raw deal I got, being stuck here in this tropical hell! Why?! Why, oh, why did fate bring me to this rock?!" and so on...) I am very happy to be leaving and for the first time in a long time, I'm looking forward to a future. However, these bubbles of nostalgia are breaking surface at an alarming rate and I can almost see an inkling of actually missing this place (just a little) on the horizon, and it all just irks the shit out of me!

{sigh}

((She looks about her room, well not her room, her sister's room, where she lives. The curtains are drawn because it is so bright and hot out. The phone rings. It's one of her father's clients. But not actually the client. The client's miscreant lover. They need another check. Right away. They have to go to court today and need money for a cab. $500 worth of cab fare. She dutifully cuts the check knowing full well the money will go for ice. Nothing would make her happier than for them to appear in court high.

They come in droves; looking to get away, in search of a better life, an easy life, in the sun, with the surf, looking to heal, start over, be one with nature, to live without challenge, be mellow, get high, so they can tell their pasty friends "on the mainland" that they live Hawaii, they've made it.

It's a magical word: Hawaii. It sparks the most ideal of concepts. But they learn. Some of them. There's real life rooted under that canopy of ideal concept. There are roads, cars, high rent, mail order, service jobs to provide the framework to stretch the magic canvas across, violence, theft, abuse, classism, racism, development--just like anywhere else. Then there's the ice. The last escape for those who escaped, and for those who never could.

But it's all worth it. To be living magic.))

Alright. I'm over it.