To All Women for Whom this May Concern:
I am not after your man. Have him all to yourself, please.
I am not trying to the be the prettiest female in the room.
Your dress looks nice, too. I mean that.
I don't invest in claws.
Take a swipe at me, if you wish.
I don't bleed.
So you might see me shrug my shoulders
As I walk away
To buy myself a cup of coffee
So I can stop yawning.
I want to say so much,
But I say nothing instead
Since I know you don't wanna be
Cloaked by my words
'Cause they remind you of of something
I can't know
So all we can do is dance
I believe in the power of people
I believe that slipping away brings regret
I believe we need to rise to the occasion
I believe rewards await beyond the threshhold
Be brave. This is the easiest it will ever be.
When eating kim chee,
Make sure you know what you're getting into.
If not, you might be surprised
By unwanted trips to mundane places
And you can't control yourself
Because it controls you.
Red flecks are exciting for a moment
The way they swirl and swirl
In your mouth and through your chest
But you do end up paying.
So, when eating kim chee,
Make sure you know what you're getting into.
The man upstairs is dying.
Just several weeks ago, his doctor told him he has between two and six months to live. It wasn't very long ago when I'd see him watering the yard.
Mr. M is a retired hapa haole man who looks straight out of a Reyn's commercial. He's managed to raise a beautiful family and be with his wife all these years.
But the weeds in the yard are growing. And this morning, instead of seeing him standing in the yard with his khaki walk shorts and aloha shirt, I see another man who rode to our house in a Toyota truck with oversized wheels. He's got a cap on and a dirty T-shirt, workboots and a towel around his face. A professional.
Sometimes at night, Mr. M's coughs are so loud and strong, the sound seeps below to our apartment. Mrs. M has taken leave to be with Mr. M, and I can only imagine her getting up to give him water or get him a towel or feed him or bathe him or change his clothes.
And still, everyone else's life goes on as usual. I still put my makeup on in the morning the same way. I listen my new Rich Crandall Jazz Trio CD. I still worry about the documents I need to write at work. I choose which dress shoes to wear from a white plastic shoe rack.
All this, while the man upstairs is dying.
I'm watching as a friend fades from Naomi's life. And mine, I guess.
I'm not certain if this is a phase, but I'm really tired of people seeing Naomi as a mere convenience. She's so dependable and caring that anyone could take her for granted. She'd always be there, no matter how selfish they may be.
I wish she would just find a friend who actually cared about her for a change.
Naomi has always been unselfish. She gives people rides and will cut out time in her day to attend to the needs of others.
Superficiality runs rampant. Suddenly Naomi has become uninteresting or not intellectually stimulating, unable to connect people to Honolulu's "professional" scene. The thing about intellectual stimulation is that it's just another kind of drug - that's all. It stimulates your senses for awhile, but you only need more and more of it to make you happy. And if others can't supply this, you blame them, not yourself, for boredom. People, then, are reduced to stimulators, vibrators or a kind of mental pornagraphy. People no longer are souls. How cruel. How very wrong.
Naomi's friend seems to be abandoning Naomi in an effort to find company that is of the same intellectual caliber. Am I being naive in my anger? Or is what's taking place in Naomi's life fair? Why can't people walk over bridges together? Why can't people show each other new worlds, instead of leaving people behind?
Are there so few people of substance in this world that they can't even see how wonderful Naomi is? Why are people so willing to throw her friendship away?
Naomi knows who she is, so she'll just move as the waves take her. She'll be OK.
Sometimes, you think some things will last a long, long time. But everything changes. I will have to find ways to manage change and move forward.
As far as friends go, you can't get much better than Kavita. She's been a faithful friend since 1999. Full of insight, and she always reaches for fairness and a kindness and a certain kind of embrace.
We go for pages and pages in e-mail, discussing our thoughts on issues very close to the heart. Today we were discussing what love means.
Kavita replied to my latest e-mail by saying this:
"Love is simple."
I was floored. The simplest phrases are always the most elegant, the most profound.
I replied with this thought:
I like the idea: "Love is simple." It really is. That's such a theme on so many levels. It's funny how we have to make all these flips and turns and be wrung out and flapped about before we can come to that conclusion.
So, no matter how many roads I travel and how silly my mistakes may be, I know where to return. "Love is simple" will from this point become home for me.
My eyelids fall
Fluorescent lights expose dormant workstations
The air conditioner makes music with my keyboard
A lonely duet
When you're alone, you suddenly know the sound of timelessness. That sound has a way of wiping clean any emotion. You feel neither apprehension nor anticipation. You simply exist, and you imagine your lungs expanding and collapsing. And the air through your nostrils become like waves on the sand, entering, retreating.
There is too much to think about now. And I don't know what to make of it. So, I'll make nothing of it. And just breathe.
I called her on Saturday afternoon. And by the time the conversation started to wind down, she was in tears.
I felt her pain travel the phone line from Dallas to here, but I couldn't do a thing about it. I disappointed her immensely, and the first love I once knew, which she loved with an overwhelming heartfelt passion, was drained from me. I finally had to tell her that her passions weren't mine anymore.
Her life is dedicated to saving the lost. Her husband is studying at a seminary. And I, I departed from wanting the same. I could've glossed over many things, but chose to be open about where I am.
God, it sure is lonely to be here sometimes. But I can't be anywhere else right now.
Walking Discoveries
Again, I took the challenge of walking to work, this time from Puck's Alley to Ala Moana. Lots of new observations: