My arm continues to heal. And does not wish to type yet. Thus, another installment of Maui for you. It makes me smile as I see my ride on the round about of time. Back again in the moment of surrendering to less.

Time is a jolly jokester making us think she is linear.

Back to the islands we go.

—————–
Maui. Day 2.

I have done almost everything I can to avoid sitting down and writing this. From ground zero of inspiration, I first did email cleanup and made appointments. Then I figured I should get dressed. Then I renewed library books (on the phone since I’m in Hawaii). Then I decided I was definitely hungry and needed a snack. And now I’m out of distractions. Because I’m sitting in the middle of paradise with no kids, no to do list, and just me myself and I. I have an island full of things I could do.

And. I’m. Just. Sitting. Here.

Earlier, at least I was watching the chickens.

They are insane. You can see their incredibly airiness as they blow themselves and each other around the yard. And they don’t stop chattering. They disappear into the tall, thick, pokey sugar cane field yobble sqwabling at one another.

“WHERE ARE YOU!?”

“I DON’T KNOW!! WHERE ARE YOU?”

“I’M OVER HERE!!!!”

“WHERE IS OVER HERE?”

“BAH!”

“BAH!”

“ACKKKKK!!!”

And by some miracle they coalesce back in the green yard of my Air Bnb and they proceed to run around in circles.

At one point, I thought I was going to get to see a cock fight. But the two combed roosters just ran at each other and pretty much sideswiped one another with a forgetfulness of their surge of rage.

No excitement there. Lots of garble but circles. Circles. And they ran more circles.

My favorite part may have been when it started raining and they were all running around together in a pod – with a straggler or two behind – looking for a place to shelter. It’s Maui. These are wild chickens. And they are panicking over rain. I think. Maybe. Who knows? Maybe there was a dude looking for dinner in the cane field and I never saw him. Who am I to doubt the native chickens? Or at least the acclimated chickens. Because I am definitely not acclimated.

I can feel my heavy and my thick and my tired. Yesterday was a doing day of wandering, seeing, and settling. Today I need some stillness. I want to do it all. But I need to do very little.

I know that I am here to do very little. That’s a tad infuriating when you’re on a gorgeous island on which the weather changes every 30 seconds. Within the course of an hour, there is pouring rain, startling blue skies, coarsing winds, and thick cloud immersions. The weather is fickle here and now. I move from sweatshirt to t-shirt. From pants to capris. From no socks to socks. In every combination possible, I feel the elements of spring in the heavy humidity (my host says this is as humid as it gets), in the summer cleansing and clearing rains (everyone is saying this is way more rainfall than they’ve had recently), in the fallish dead and decaying leaves piled and browning beside the lanai (no one has tried to explain those away to me but I think the trick is that I haven’t asked about them), and in the wintery bite of the wind last evening which descended into my bones on the central part of the island. After a relaxing and settling somatic movement class, any released muscles contracted to guard my defenseless frame of a body against the cold whip. Brrr.

4 seasons. One day. Over and over again, they ride.

One full day. I have been here one full day. And the weather has me feeling like it is a full year. The seasons in their constant turn. Others may say island life doesn’t have four seasons like the mainland. No doubt that is true. But change here is unrelenting in a whole different way. Is that why the locals inherited a deep sense of nature? Because she is constantly shaping, shifting, and moving hour to hour and even minute to minute here? Because she always has a new secret to reveal? Because she doesn’t let you hold too tightly to one moment as you don’t know when that sunshine will obscure. When that blue sky will draw clouds in sleep. When the quiet of stillness will be smothered by the winds of smooth.

The chickens run in circles. I sit still.

What’s the difference really?

Cluck cluck,
Rachel