The Things We Do for Love

His eyes were the color of the ocean that raged inside of him. It crashed against the sheer rock cliffs that guarded his heart. The ocean raged and tormented and swirled and laughed and never calmed. She saw all this and smiled. She didn’t know why she smiled. His eyes weren’t quite sapphires and they weren’t quite aquamarine or tanzanite. They were his and only his. They grew dark or light as the ocean allowed.

She swam in the oceans for far too long, years perhaps. Her body was raked over jagged rock, scraped, crushed, raw yet she stayed. She clung to the rock face of his heart. The waves would rip her off and she’d climb again over and over. Her fingers and toes became long spiny claws and slowly the waves were unable to rip her down. But the battle had changed her. She became black and bitter and defiant. She was a sea urchin, a rock urchin. She was stuck forever in her spot on the rock cliffs unable to climb, unable to fall. She was prickly and poisonous and even the ocean stopped paying attention to her. Eventually he stopped paying attention to her and he smiled.

If the rock walls ever came down if the wild ocean every won she would be forgotten. She would wash up a fossil, a relic, centuries later on the inviting sandy beaches of his heart. The ocean would toss her carcass in play and it would laugh.

Slowly the sea urchin began to climb. Moving an inch every so often. Slow enough the ocean never noticed. Slow enough he never noticed.  Over time, over much time, she reached the precipice. The sunlight penetrated her spines. Warmed her being and slowly she felt herself emerge. Her shell cracked her spikes turned back into fingers and toes. She had limbs and hair and breasts and in front of her was a vast desert. A barren wasteland of sun and dust, petrified stone and bleached skulls.

When she got to her feet, the ocean crashed high and hard and loud against the rocks, trying to reach her, trying to pull her back down. The ground beneath her feet shuddered and the wind blew hot and fast. The sand ripping at her face. She began to run as she ran the whole place shook. The chunk of cliff where she was standing previously cracked and fell into the furious sea. She ran until the land stopped quivering and her feet began to bleed.

The sun, the heat, the sand, the dry started to consume her. She felt her flesh grow leathery. She could only run in short bursts now along the hot barren wasteland. Unsure if the direction she was going was the right one. She could no longer see the ocean and the sun was eternal. There was no night. There was no break from the heat. Where she once thought she would drown in the ocean of his soul she now though his heart would consume every bit of moisture. She would crumble to dust and blow away with the wind. The wind would toss her back out into the ocean. Her hands and toes once again turned to claws and her skin became the color of the desert. It was all reflected in her brown scales and long tail as she scurried along the fissured surface. She began to forget anything other than to dig and scurry long the splintered, dusty shell of earth. She became lost in the blinding sun.

Her tongue flicked at her eyes, moistened them. She scurried in quick bursts, taking deep breaths in through her nose. Had she been lost for years or days as the sun beat down? There in the distance her heart thumped quick in her chest.  She zipped from under a bleached stone to the shade of a petrified lizard.  It was a molehill. She felt her senses come back to her as the rain started to fall and she ran, rejuvenated, to the mountain. A storm raged ripping up the dead dust and hurling it into the dark clouds. The ground became mud and she no longer had claws and her tail fell off with a painful snap. She was upright and laughed at the storm. He clutched his chest coughing.

The mountain loomed menacing and vile and dangerous. She sneered. Everything shook violently and compulsively and angrily. She could hear the ocean again and the whispers of the sand in the wind. She could hear the venom in their tongues.

She climbed. She climbed with passion and enthusiasm. She climbed with love and purpose. It kept her going until the cold stole the breath from her lungs. She knew she was destined to drown in the ocean and crumble to dust in the desert but now it was certain she would freeze for his heart. Yet she moved. Crawling and she felt her hair grow long. Her hands and feet became stumps hardened to hooves. On all fours, her ears grew long and curled back on themselves and she traveled up the mountain. It was endless night. It was brutal and cold. Her breath froze and her soul was forgotten. For a while, she meandered content with the fact that movement kept her warm. She wandered. Until the night began to laugh at her. The snow began to taunt her. She ran and rammed full force into the mountain repeatedly. Her anger hot and palpable. Eventually the mountain yielded. She reached the top and he stood there with eyes black as the night. She galloped to him. Feeling her horns break off sending waves of pain through her. She was on her magnificent two legs again and she ran open armed to him.

This world fragmented when she felt his embrace. She saw the ocean and desert in his eyes. The cold that whipped around them no longer touched her.

“You have to jump,” he said with a half smile.

“You have to jump with me,” she said with all seriousness.

His smile left him. “I’m not the one the heart wants.”

She looked over her shoulders. To her right a volcano, spewing hot and red. To her left the raging sea, which swallowed up the desert.

“You made it this far to me, you only have to jump,” He was desperate his eyes matched the air around them.

“You have to love yourself,” She said.

It seemed like he let out a primeval bellow but his mouth never opened. He hugged her deeply.

“We’ll jump together,” he promised.

“You jump first,” she said.

He looked at her frantically, madly, fearfully. They kissed deeply and she let go of him. As he fell, she whispered to the storm “I’m not coming.”

His body crashed into the lava and the mountain cracked, gyrated and heaved. The wind fell flat and the sky began to fall.

“The things we do for love.” She whispered to his heart as she dove gracefully into the calm ocean. She watched the world die. Sinking poetically into the sea. She swam to the edge of the ocean and let herself fall off, free.

The Snow & I

Fluffy, big, white ice falls from the sky and I grin, even though no one is around to see it. As the snow touches the ground and sticks, I am filled with giddy excitement. It’s Christmas day in my mind. The snow turns everything pretty, everything white and soft.

My childhood was full of beauty and sunshine and fresh fruit. In Hawaii, you grow up active: swimming, surfing, hiking, camping, paddling, everything. Sundays were beach days. We’d go to our favorite beach, Bellows. My dad would bring a shovel and dig a huge hole in the sand with a ledge for us kids to sit on. The hole would be close to the shoreline so the waves would jump over. My dad called it the beach Jacuzzi. We’d walk the beach looking for glass balls (old fishing buoys), shells and sea glass. We’d make sand castles and more, almost every weekend. At the end of the day, my dad would usually have to swim out to get me back in I loved the water so much.

I still love the water and can’t see myself living somewhere without it. I haven’t lived home in Hawaii since 2003 but I have lived near beaches on the East and West Coast. I find peace and serenity in water.

The first time I saw snow actually falling was when I was 16 and living with my aunt in Connecticut. I was so enthralled. So consumed with watching the flakes fall, that my teacher stopped a math class so I could open up a window and stick my hand out. I still remember the snow’s cold touch. One of my classmate’s said “It’s just like watching a child.” Living with my aunt and her family exposed me to the wonders of winter. We’d go sledding in the yard and neighborhood. I laughed and stayed out until my cheeks were red from cold and my fingers went numb. They took me snowboarding, I was terrible but wasn’t afraid to fall because I knew underneath me was that sweet, supple, powder.

In Hawaii, as a family we hiked, we kayaked, we bonded. We even used to go to drive in movies every few weekends before they closed it down. As a kid if I was “bored” I was encouraged to go down to the beach with my Tutu (grandmother). You’d be amazed how a beach can monopolize a kid’s time – swimming, picking seaweed. Give me a bogey board and the ocean and I’ll still spend hours waiting for the perfect wave. Even after my mother passed away, my father and I always made time for each other. We’d go on long walks together before dinner or kayak rides to the sand bar. There were some Christmas mornings we would go surfing. Despite all the amazing beauty and weather and water Hawaii has to offer you still grow up watching the same movies and TV shows as every other kid.

You grew up wanting a white Christmas, though not really understanding what that meant. You saw autumn leaves in beautiful colors being racked into piles for children to jump on. As a kid, I wanted that. You wanted to be normal and have your family be like the one on TV. While our Thanksgivings were full of love and food and friends and family, it wasn’t the least bit chilly out and fall colors were the same as summer, spring and winter – green. Hawaii doesn’t even practice daylight savings time because our days don’t drastically shorten given the season. In the “winter” it is greener in Hawaii than in the “summer” where it browns out a little. Hawaii is a constant while the mainland is fickle with its weather.

I think it’s the way it falls from the sky that makes me so animated. It floats, like something from a dream. It flies down on wind currents and unseen air pressures. It can come down in big soft clumps or delicate tiny powder-like flakes. It can be those intricate delicate snowflakes or several that form a crystal-like growth. It’s beautiful and simple and turns the landscape a different color.

Snow is something I never experienced until I was an adult. I know the science behind what makes it, and I know it causes accidents, road closures, power outages and worse. Sitting at my desk, writing this I am overcome with how lovely and yielding it is. It makes everything the same color which comforts me and in a way reminds me of home. While Hawaii is perpetually green, the snow is perpetually white. It’s a constant.