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OAHU DIARY 7
27 September 26, 2003
I sit on Hawaiian Airlines flight 35 from Phoenix to
Honolulu. I feel sober. I feel exultant. Exultant?
Well, I am at 35,000 feet.
To be serious, for a change, I sit with right foot
still encased in the plastic boot, wrapped with Velcro
straps. The pain is gone. Mostly. I’ve been healing
for 35 days. No bad outcomes. I have to be careful,
but the expected outcome is hopeful.
“This is not rocket science, dad,” Tyler explained the
surgery to reattach the Achilles. “But you gotta take
it easy for 12 weeks, and on for the first year,” he
added. Tyler, Heidi’s husband, is in his second year
of residency for Orthopedic Surgery, in Columbus,
Ohio.
Courtney wrote, in response to my last Oahu Diary,
saying, Anybody wanna play racketball? My last partner
quit right in the middle of the game and took off for
San Antonio!
Here on the plane, the overhead monitors show hula
maidens, smiling, inviting.
The aisles are packed with more ordinary bodies,
mostly middle aged. Eyes bright, they escape to
Hawaiin beaches to regain dreams of youth.
The guy next to me, poor guy, flies into Honolulu
today, Friday, and returns to New York Sunday. He’s on
business, he tells me. He’s gotta look at a couple of
nursing homes his company just bought. I tell him a
couple things he should see, big expert that I am. But
my heart sinks, knowing he is leaving before he can
get to experience most anything. Like walking into a
Luau, looking at the food, and departing hungry.
As I look inward, I feel carefree. That’s the right
word. Carefree. I have mostly nothing to do. After
that, I’ll do a repeat. My condo awaits me, I’m told.
I’m excited to buy some stuff for the condo. A fridge,
microwave, toaster oven, Lazy-Boy recliner.
Technology: For my laptop, a hub so I can connect to
the internet while I am down at the pool, or the
beach,
to do a little stock trading. Technology.
Salvation without technology is monotony.
I look forward:
To regain my Oahu memory of a lithesome woman fishing
the wharf at Pearl Harbor. “I love fishing,” she
gushed. “I love fishing,” she repeated, not knowing I
heard her the first time.
A fresh teenager, Olivia, with seven friends jumping
off Laie point into the ocean surf 34 feet below.
Olivia hasn’t learned how enchantingly beautiful she
is. Watching her and her pals becomes unmatchable.
The Temple at Laie. In the dawn. Sun ablaze on white
stone, sun reflected in the front eight windows,
reflection pool alight, palms towering up front. But,
mostly, the clouds. Bursting, bright, reds, yellows,
whites. Edges afire in unmatched brilliance. And,
distant, the sky in brilliant blue blends, azure,
aqua, turquoise. Then, up close, a bright yellow
hibiscus bursts to greet the morning.
I look back:
In Pleasanton, bright eyed Marin runs to the freezer
to get the frozen gel bag for my foot, for the
umpteenth time. “Sure!” she responds even the next
time I ask, as cheerful as the first. Tricia throws
her arms around my neck and confesses, “I love you,
dad” after she confesses to another my departure is
“bittersweet”. A new friend picks me up, wheelchair,
crutches and all, and we traipse off to SeaWorld, the
Art Museum and the Riverwalk. I sing. I think. I give
thanks for a body, a brain, life.
In Provo I met my MBA buddies. Quinn, Gordon, Gary,
Doug and the others. I miss Rudy, a real pal, now
departed. Its been 40 years since we 13 pioneered the
first BYU MBA graduating class, now ranked 26th. We
talk, we laugh, we remember. Deep down, I feel a tear.
Tears unshed remain tears felt.
I rub shoulders with Kaleo of Samoa. We speak of
business consulting. And bump into Janet, Patti. April
hugs me, says “Call adin,” and we’re pals. Harrison
wonders, “Can’t you stay longer, Grandpa?” Dylan says
“I can try!” when I ask him if he can paint a picture.
But, mostly, I look forward.
And, now I see Oahu, far below. For the second time in
two months. The waves, the clouds, the mountains.
Feels a little more like home.
Copyright 2002 Paul L. Tripp |
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Oahu
Diary Eight October 20, 2003
Lotta things have happened since my last Oahu Diary.
First, the Achilles. Its healing. It itches. It works.
I walk around in a regular shoe. I gotta do exercises.
I swim. I lounge in the surf, carefully.
Unexpected news about the foot injury is that five
good things happened: The tendon will be good as new,
about a year after it snapped. Second, I provided some
helpful consulting to Jonathan and experienced
Tricia’s caring. Third, Jeff and I made stock market
investment plans and April likewise cared while I
spent a week with them in Happy Valley, where,
incidentally, I palled (paled? did pal?) around with
MBA friends from 42 years ago.
Fourth, the grandkids, all around, cared for me in
precious moments.
Fifth, I found a new pal in Texas. She’s female. She
stole my heart. She has large brown eyes. Long lashes.
She’s friendly.
She wouldn’t cuddle, tho. She nuzzles. We hung out,
mostly, at the corral.
She don’t write. Don’t even read. Can’t be sure she
even remembers me. She’s moo--sical. Texas gots a
lotta cows, don’t they.
Actually, fifth, I really found a new Texas Pal. And,
I ain’t sayin’ no more on that.
I flew back to Oahu the 26th of September. Settled in
my condo Saturday the 28th. Got accosted by my Nazi
Condo Manager the 30th, when I left a dish drainer in
the hall four hours. She called Security on me. I
haven’t felt secure since.
This condo, in Hauula, is really very nice. Clean
halls, fresh landscape. Painted. The ocean only 80
feet from the back entrance. Lighted at night. Pool,
open only 10am to 6pm, but I swim in it 20 minutes as
often as my lethargic schedule permits.
I went the 44 miles to Walmart about 10 times. Five of
them for returns. Wal-Mart in Mililani works for me. I
got a lamp, microwave, toaster oven, 27” TV, sheets,
shampoo, paper towels, 409, picture frames, Swiffer
mop,
hand blender and a case of diet A&W. Cost me
$988. I saved the receipts.
I buy my groceries, mostly, at FoodLand in Laie. When
you’re in FoodLand, its fun. Super-friendly
brown-skinned girls, women and men smile and take your
money. Tanya walks me to my Miata, smiles as I unload
groceries into my trunk, gives me a big hug, returns
the cart back inside. Well, I exaggerated one of those
events. You decide.
FoodLand has Haole and Hawaiian foods. Or, there’s
enough Samoans here you could say, Palagi and Samoan
food. Like, they offer packaged shrimp, $12 a pound.
Okay. Pricey, but firm, fresh shrimp. But, they have
Hawiian Poke. Its chopped up tuna, dipped in Clorox
and sprinkled with sea weed. I could be wrong about
the Clorox. All they said was “spicy.” But, it tasted
like Clorox to me.
I’m broad minded. I’ll eat anything once.
C2003 Paul Tripp |
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Oahu Diary
Nine November 11, 2003
Hawaii Smells. It stinks, actually.
At least, Oahu.
I know, you’ve never heard this before. Its in none of
the brochures.
But, I’m tellin you.
It stinks. It smells. And, I admit it, its fragrant.
Alla these.
It never occurred to me when I came here I would smell
Hawaii.
“You’re goin to Hawaii?” my friends asked me.
“Yeah. I wanna smell it,” I cudda answered, but it
never occurred to me.
What I’ve learned here is there’s just a lot of smells
here. It’s the tropics, after all. And, smells magnify
in the tropics.
So I’m at a football game at Aloha Stadium in Honolulu
a couple Fridays ago. And I start sniffing, for real.
Actually, I didn’t have much choice. The game, between
University of Hawaii and UTEP, grew distant in that
big stadium where the Pro Bowl is played before 14
million locals and 2.3 billion worldwide fans.
Hawaii beat up on UTEP, and I was so far away in end
zone tickets I thought for a minnit we were at a
picnic and the players were the ants.
Oh, yeah, the smells.
I just start sniffing. And I get more than I bargained
for.
Beer. Seems everybody has a plastic cup of beer. Sip,
sip, sip. So, I start by smelling the dull stench of
beer.
Next, peanuts. I’m not surprised. I’m eating them.
They’re kinda salty, dry, old, some rancid. They
didn’t taste or smell good. But, just what other
low-glycemic foods are left to eat at Aloha Stadium?
The wind swirls. It brings me, alternately, perfume,
sweat, garlic, fresh cool air, and, of course
cigarette smoke.
I’m talking to Doctor Courtney, next to me, about the
Smells of Hawaii. “You know, dad,” he explains,
remembering page 1452 from his medical dictionary,
“the tongue can only distinguish four tastes.” Right
away,
I know he’s wrong once again, but he goes on,
“The nose can distinguish over 200 smells.”
Well, I figure, it must be something like that. So we
start naming the smells of Hawaii we have experienced.
Plumeria, Tuber rose, Hybiscus. Hah, got you there.
Hybiscus has no odor. Just looks good. Like the bikini
babes I’ve seen.
The low areas, the rivers, the dank, the rotting, even
the sewer overflows.
Baking bread smells better on Oahu. I got a
bread-maker and bake a loaf every day, just for the
smell.
Oh, brother, there’s the cigarette smoke comes into my
open louver windows; also the peppermint smell each
morning at 4:47 sharp. Not bad.
Coconut oil, also rancid, in a Polynesian girl’s hair.
And, the boy in front of me at church that smells like
asphalt.
Mahi-mahi, served fresh at Zippy’s.
I walk from Aloha Stadium. In the parking lot, lots of
cigarette smoke, mixed with burned barbecued chicken
left from before-game tail-gate festivities. And,
beer. More beer.
Driving home, on H3, over the Pali, I smell dry tires.
In the tunnel its like an old moist mattress. And, at
the same time, I’m surprised I can smell the tile on
the tunnel walls and ceiling. Tile? What does tile
smell like? Well. Well, like tile.
Hawaii. Oahu. Its smells. Its gettin like home. Smells
friendly. Now.
I’ll take all 200 smells. Oahu, to me, you smell.
Right.
C2003 Paul Tripp |
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