We are all artisans of our own life and some days we owe it to ourselves to call our canvas complete… even if we’ve already started a new one.

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This means I can finally tackle the family website next year- and have room to grow the myriad of projects that were formerly having to play sardines in the old world.

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to find myself, or a place for myself, in this world that is a billion realities

where do i already exist? where am i missing? what’s new. what’s familiar. and what’s in between. the nuances in relationships between times, space and people. where i can disappear and what’s ultimately mine. studying the laws of the universe around me so i can both adapt and take form, and try on the infinity of rules so i can feel comfortable existing.

I don’t know that I’ll ever be comfortable, for as soon as I master a new realm (be it a social circle or new activity) I’m already thirsting for something new. This insatiable hunger for experiential learning (I’m not someone to sandbag on your trivia team) propels me so long as I don’t hide in my fears.

And that’s me: Photographer as a healing, mental and spiritual practice. A social confidante.

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I have a dream that one day on the golden hills of Silicon Valley and in the lush shade of Silicon Forest, business and organizational leaders will sit at the table of processes and system design, build and operation with REAL PEOPLE.

Let’s face it. In today’s fast paced world, when everyone’s faced with more decisions than ever and at an accelerating pace, we can’t afford to keep forgetting that those “users” we either need to collect data from or push data to (via our web site, application or larger organizational process) are REAL PEOPLE.

Think about yourself on a busy day. If you have to spend too much time trying to figure something out (like how to submit a form, or purchase that perfect gift) then chances are likely you’re not going to do it. And what about if you have to spend hours doing something that should take only 15 minutes? You’re likely to put that task off, or not get as much done in your week as you could. Your organization loses money and you lose valuable time.

That’s why I focus on the REAL PEOPLE. I believe everyone deserves a few extra minutes with their kids, pets, friends, family or self every day. Time I can easily give everyone via intuitive interfaces, well defined data and easy interactions.

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when i was 8 i wanted braces – i’d make my own with paper clips.

when i was 10 i wanted contacts – i’d suck on ice and put it in my eyes.

when i was 12 i wanted to be an alcoholic – and get caught, and have someone to fight with me, for me, love me, save me, hold me. instead i hid a bottle of whisky in the basement and counted bug bites and scars with my sister – we each wanted to have it worse off than the other.

at 12 i started smoking – under the bridge under a church, and cried when we got caught and lost our limousine ride.

at 12 i wanted, finally, boys instead of to be one, a boy – i wore showy clothes until a sketchy man followed us on a bus for days: she has a sweet ass. until we rode with mom who talked of target practice and our black belt tests and he never followed us again.

when i was 14 i wanted something to stand for: no war – beads in my hair, hacky sack circles, pot, green beret, red and blue lennon glasses. i’d smoke on the roof of the school and write my own basketball diaries.

when i was 16 i wanted to die, i lied. i wanted someone to discover me and find me worth loving, saving, holding, helping and tell me life would be ok. instead i found my sister and fought for my brothers.

at 28 i’m a perfectionist at 12 times 4 and want time to fu¢k up, with someone, a safety net, to catch me.

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if i’d have known you as a Saguero, i’d have hunted for your flowers at night: suckled stamina, swam in scents, and kissed each sweetly good night – before they close in morning (for eternity?)

if i’d have known you as a Vampire, i’d have been seduced into the quagmire of dead love – dived from the tallest sky ledge: a gyring peregrine to battle blind bat – no blood required for a beatless heart.

if i’d known you as a Gladiator, i’d have given you an iron mask to bask in the crowd’s glory before watching you die.

if i’d known you as a Man, i’d have held your hand, your body and your mind: loved you in every particle and antiparticle, vast as sand and rings of saturn – and let go.

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Then I received a letter from ODS saying that I was declined the health insurance I applied for over a month ago, because I answered “yes” to having ever gone to therapy. In the box provided, where they wanted to know what ailment I suffered from, I wrote: “trauma. somatic theraphy – not covered by insurance. not sure this is even applicable here. call me with any questions.”

I figure most of us have had a traumatic childhood or past at one point or another, so it seemed like an OK answer. I haven’t been diagnosed with any mental illness, learning disorder or personality disorder which is what I figured they were going after. I just want to learn new behaviors so I’m not stuck in the mind of a freaked out, frustrated and bitter 16 year old for the rest of my life.

Now I kick myself. I should have known to lie: “Nope, never gone to therapy. I don’t believe in a person’s ability to mature emotionally, nutrition’s role in physical and mental ailments or one’s right to better their experience of life.”

Really?

Apparently, their take is that people who seek out support and guidance are more likely to get sick or need a doctor or file a claim. Only my experience has been quite the opposite. Take, for instance, a friend who suffered from chronic headaches and muscle pains (she had an arm like Dick Cheney). She went to doctors and no one knew what was up. She then took a week long meditation retreat and “magically” the pains went away and she could move her arm again. Or a friend whose severe migraines stopped recurring after a few months of therapy. No more doctor visits, copays or claims needed. Hmmm…

I’m utterly confused. When will this country get its head out of its arse?

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It’s not a novel concept. Even as I write it, the old hymn from church lulls me back to the days when I loved singing in church. I could be loud and still unseen, lingering in a place where no wrong and no right exist. “Ask, and it shall be given unto you. Seek, and ye shall find. Knock, and the door shall be opened unto you…”

Ehehm. I remind myself I’m not in church anymore and I’ve long since put my Catholicism in a shoe box in a larger box in an attic or basement shelf. Still, minus the goddiness of the flashback musical, the reminder calms me. Cogs that had been grinding and getting stuck are now churning with their counterparts effortlessly. (Like that transition period from a stressful day at work to a warm embrace with your partner and the notion that this is what life is about. Or watching a child (or cat) play with sunlight dancing on the floor. And your brain shifts out of the overstressed, poorly greased life-is-complicated gear into the silent hum of autopilot and life-is-simple.)

Calm, I think back over the past few months as I’ve practiced the art of asking for what I want. (Be it a home made dinner, a quiet night alone, for you to listen or for you to shut up.) And how uncanny it is that my success rate of getting what I wanted shot through the roof.

Think of it like being a passenger in a car. You can either sit quietly in the back seat and just hope the driver goes where you want them to. Or you can call shot gun and do a little “front-seat” driving by asking the driver to take you where you want to go. Yes, they can still say no (and likely will if you insist on telling them exactly how to drive vs where to drive). But your chances just got a heck of a lot better than when you weren’t saying anything at all. And you can be your own driver. I imagine being Joan Didion as Maria, driving fast in my convertible down the freeway and feel my lungs expanding to take in the fantastic freedom and exhale both serenity and anticipation (a delicious cocktail).

So when (and how) did I fall out of the practice/convertible’s front seat without knowing it?

Damn, it feels good to be a gansta. (I’m really digging this driving a convertible feeling!) It’s not that I don’t want to spend hours/days/weeks trying to figure out why I’m afraid or forgot the art of asking. I just don’t want to clutter the moment. (And, until I thought about it, I was happy to not have the hymn still stuck in my head. “Damn, it feels good to be a gansta…..

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Today we do a little sight seeing and I discover my favorite market. While Paul drops me off at the shops in Paiea, I stumble into a grocery upon their promise of fresh sushi in the deli. I want to take this entire market back to Portland, or move to Maui so I can claim it as my market, as I do with my coop. Tiny aisles lined with fresh, local fruits, vegetables, bread, dairy and the prices compare with crappy, florescent lit Safeway. I spend a good 1/2 half hour reading the produce labels. Tangellos, limes and dragon fruit grown in Maui. Potatoes from Oregon. Peppers and tomatoes from California. Local asparagus, green beans and lemon grass. Yams from another island. Local avocados the size of a Bocci ball and half the price of the imports from Safeway.

I’m disappointed in the rest of the shops I visit. Same imports from Bail, Indonesia and Philippines we get in Portland. My friends requested “something from Maui” and I take that as something made in Maui.
We take a scenic route out of Paia, past a beautiful church and the only sugar cane plant left in operation. I expect it to smell sweet but instead am greeted with a nauseating sulfur/sewer smell about a 1/2 mile before we pass the plant.

Paul snags a great deal on used snokel equipment at Snorkel Bob’s, with his kama’aina discount and a sweetheart at Boss Frog’s gives me a similar discount for my rental. (Even though kama’aina means “children of the land” or a native-born Hawaiian, many stores give discounts to Hawaiian residents. All you need is a driver’s license, which Paul managed to get with the help of a friend’s address. Technically, he’s a malihini, or newcomer, though he’s been visiting since 76.)

I’m a lowly haole, or cracker-faced minority, and frightened to snorkel. I want to see the fish but I don’t trust that I’ll breathe OK w/the tube. As I lower my head in the water, my breath quickens and heart races, making it even more difficult to trust that I’ll be able to hold my breath should water get in. After a few minutes, my breathing resumes to normal and I’m already trying to take pictures of the most amazing fish I’ve swam near (and seen). The Humuhumukununukuapua’a with its neon tips that almost appear to glow in the dark, some long skinny translucent fish that mesmerize me for some time. Other colors I haven’t seen since 1990, when I thought it was cool to wear biker shorts & tanks splashed in neon. (Thank god I was only 11 and can blame my mom, as it’s her and my same uncle Paul in all the pictures that prove I wore such brilliant fashion.)

To top off a perfectly relaxing day, I cook the Moonfish we bought earlier at the Paia market in a spontaneous sauce of: milk, butter, grated ginger and garlic, Bragg’s ginger and sesame dressing and a Soy Tahini sauce. It is received with great glee from Paul and will be my favorite food accomplishment this trip.

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Mahalo. Not sure what this word means, but the folks on Hawaiian can’t get enough of this word. A friendly gentleman tells me that tomorrow and Sunday will be the best days to learn how to surf and I’m not sure if this is truth or the days he’ll be at the beach. And where are the Hawaiian shirts, sari’s and clear blue skies? (Finally! A girl dallies to her gate in a floral sun dress. Hope trickles in.) The air is muggy and my first destination is a bathroom where I can shed my layers and don a loose fitting white t-shirt. Other than the outdoor and open air walkways and terminals, the airport is San Jose’s … a tiny strip with baggage claim at the end where it curves and transforms into car rentals. The sky reminds me of Phoenix, both bright and dreary simultaneously.

And then I get the call. My uncle is pulling up in a red, convertible turbo PT Cruiser and I’m swept away to meet Maui for my first time. (Don’t forget the turbo! We’re not sure what it means, but Paul loves revving and punching and accelerating fast.) Kahalui is a sprawling suburb. We drive past the Cosco and almost stop to pick up IPod speakers and then realize we don’t need them. Gas stations (at $3/gallon) and shopping centers line the 2-lane crowded street and we crawl out of town. Paul points out Hakalalia, nearly undistinguishable in the vog. Vog. My uncle’s a funny guy and I wonder if this is a word he’s coined or island slang. Apparently, I chose a bad day to fly in, as this Volcano ash fOG has only been blown in by the Kano winds this morning. And they will persist for my first few days.

A few minutes out of the city, the landscape morphs into sugar cane fields which remind me of Vietnam war movies than any farmland I’ve seen. No “rows” pop out as we drive by. (Not like rows and diagonals of corn and soybeans as you drive by, which could mesmerize me for hours on long car rides.) Simply overgrown jungle grass. And it’s beautiful in it’s seeming disorganization.

== SPOILER ALERT: Do not read below this line if you don’t want to become overrun with jealousy or have never visited Maui and need not discover how your life may be lacking. ==

After some grocery shopping in Kihei (I won’t bore you with the insane prices … but I won’t complain about $3 milk anymore) we head to the condo my uncle’s rented at Mana Kai Resort. I’ll later learn, from an essay written by Tara Bray Smith on Hawaii in “State by State: a Panoramic Portrait of America” that mana is the life force Hawaiians believe inhabits all things. Kai is the sea. I’m greeted with songs of the tropical birds.

It’s nearing sunset already, so we don our suits and wade into the ocean. A seasoned ocean swimmer, Paul dives right in as I wait for something … a warm current perhaps? (Do fish pee, I wonder. And if they do, perhaps it’ll be just enough to warm the water.) And then the waves roll in and I’m under water and I’m instantly relaxed. We wash off and watch the sun set into the horizon, just to the right of the shadow of Kahoolawe Island. I try to recall uncle Tom’s notes on how far one can see on water (he was in the Navy) and end up Googling it instead. Turns out we see 3-4 nautical miles. But I digress.

It’s now time to head up to Maui Meadows for a relaxing and delicious dinner party, on the “foot hills” of the large volcano, Haleakala. I’m stunned by the lush vegetation on our climb and the open entry way of the hacienda style home. Art everywhere! Sculptures, paintings, photographs, a large mirror rumored to mimic those in Versailles (and I make a mental not to look this up and visit some day). And the people … they’re energetic, young, healthy, attractive. I’m by far the youngest person at the table and suddenly I’m afraid of being the boring, tired, naive niece. I don’t do yoga, work in the “new age” fields, eat a raw-food diet, own my own business (anymore) and haven’t traveled out of the US. But the Moon Fish is delicious and I even though I want more, I eat the salad. If I can look this great at 50+ I’ll eat the salad and learn how to keep my body’s acidity down by consuming foods high in Alkalinity: apple cider vinegar, limes (which can be confusing since they’re citric), millet and quinoa, and most veggies. And pay attention to the energy of my foods: cold (raw fish, veggies) and warm, yin and yang. And give myself a few breaks to enjoy alcohol, like this tasty Rum.

I’ll save the conversation which compares the Hawaiian archipelago to the Chakras for another time.

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