I’ve only left Kailua two times since we moved here. Once to go into Ala Moana for lunch and the second time to Police Beach on the North Shore. It’s funny, nothing happens here and yet the day goes so quickly. I wake up early (sometimes as early as 6AM) and still the afternoon pounces on me. Today we played frisbee in the park, saw a giant turtle while doggy paddling in the ocean, and then made pancakes, sausage, and eggs for brunch. It was a great day and this is a great town. It’s easy to wile away the hours here. It’s really something to find myself, a hard-milled New Yorker, suddenly so immersed in a town that makes Honolulu seem exotically metropolitan.
Everyday that we go to the beach I want to go to the beach more. I grew up on Long Island and my heritage is Filipino. Beaches are nature and nurture to me and yet until I came to Hawaii I hated going to the beach! I think it’s because I would get caught up in the preparation, the ritual of self consciousness around the bathing suit, and inevitably at the end of any beach trip the sticky sandiness which follows you to the parking lot, into the car, into the house, and all over your tub. Trips to the beach were 80% trip and 20% beach.
Why it’s different here:
- Usually going to the beach happens within 5 minutes of deciding to go to the beach
- I have one sufficient bathing suit and it hangs by the door
- We have a stack of towels and sheets in the laundry room ready to go
- We have an outdoor shower (!) which I love. I love the outdoor shower. It’s amazing because it’s a hot cold shower and with it we keep a little bottle of strawberry scented shampoo and a bar of soap. I’m more clean coming back into the house from the beach than when I left.
I remember when we were going through craigslist looking for a place. We were calling any ad that had the slightest promise. When we got to the ad for this place it listed an outdoor shower as one of its special features. I called and spoke to the owner and she reiiterated before we got off the phone that there was a hot cold outdoor shower.
After a few minutes of worrying over all the details of the various apartments in my head I suddenly said to K, ‘wait a minute, is the outdoor shower the ONLY shower?’ He didn’t know and wasn’t familiar enough with Hawaii property to say for sure it wasn’t. I decided to call.
ME: Uh Charlotte, hi this is Nancy…we just spoke about the rental..um yeah I just wanted to check something…uhhh. I mean I just wanted to make sure….um you know that outdoor hot cold shower..uh well I just wanted to check is their an indoor shower too?
Charlotte very kindly didn’t laugh at me and said yes. The outdoor shower was just for coming back from the beach. There were in fact two additional indoor showers.
Three One Nine 