As I think back about growing up
in Hawaii, certain places pop up as vivid images.
Chasing trains in the cane fields
with my dad -- I accompanied my dad as he drove our Studebaker along dirt roads
through the sugar cane fields on Oahu, following the trains that hauled the cut
cane. One time we hitched a ride on one
of the narrow gauge engines, smoke spewing, the wind in our hair, feeling on
top of the world.
The hot springs on the island of
Hawaii -- On a vacation with my folks and my friend, Mike Gillespie, we stopped
at a hot spring. Mike and I floated in
the crystal clear warm water and my dad took a picture of us from a cliff
above. I still have the picture, but the
hot spring no longer exists. A lava flow
inundated it about ten years later.
Inventing things in my backyard
-- Before school I’d go out in our backyard where I had a collection of
airplane, radio and other miscellaneous parts and build contraptions, my
inventions.
Being at school at night -- In
the fourth grade I was a candy cane in the school Christmas pageant. We performed at night and after getting in
our costumes, we walked around campus, hiding from each other in the
shadows. School during the day was
mundane, but at night it was magical.
The underwater cave on Mokulua --
Our junior year picnic took place at Lanikai beach. One of our teachers, Mr. Paulsen, took us out
to one of the Mokulua Islands by boat and led us into an underwater cave where
he told Hawaiian ghost stories. The cave
can only be entered at low tide. Sitting
on the sand at the end of cave, I felt scared by the thought of the tide coming
in and excited about being there. This led to a key scene in my first published
novel, Retirement Homes Are Murder.
Rocky Hill -- My senior year in high school, a group of us would congregate on Saturday nights at the top of Rocky Hill on the edge of the Punahou campus to sing folk songs. Looking out over Honolulu, being with friends and singing (I fortunately was always drowned out) gave me a sense of completeness.
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