Lovah Lovah ❤︎
Constructing shields.
Creating a safe haven.
Mīkana.
Not be confused with the resident Front Porch Rainbows.
Trudging tru da jungle.
This is how I feel when I have to don skirt suits and meet with Lieutenant Governors.
Thing is, itʻs how I see everyone else, too.
Just a bunch of children trying their part at surviving in a grown up world.
i ka hale māua.
Came and went.
The world moved on.
What a surprise.
For over twenty years this right here has been the core of our long conversations, the roots of our committed friendship; Nā Wai ‘Ehā, the Sovereign Nation, how to mobilize our peers, and how to educate people, especially the detractors. Now, to see this image, to see how far we have evolved as individuals, to see how far the movement has evolved! To be celebrating Lā Ho‘i Ho‘i Ea today in the wake of witnessing 20 arrests of our brothers and sisters who put their bodies on the line for aloha ‘āina, the first action of its kind on Maui in our lifetimes and there we are! Here we are! In the middle of the dream we've been dreaming for decades! Dreamtime manifest!
Here you are in your strength, maka ‘ala, protecting everyone, protecting me. Like you've always done. While proudly escorting me to big offices with big wigs in Honolulu who were asking my 24-year old self to run for office. Keeping a straight face when I make clear to them that I'll run, so long as they know that the State of Hawai‘i is illegitimate and if elected I will not cease advocating for sovereignty. When people come up to ask you about "that crazy anarchist chick" and your response was "Yeah, she's my best friend and you can't handle her." The biathlon, the adventures, the critics, and on, and on.
For much of our adult lives, we bobbed and weaved in and out of one another's lives like a frustratingly cliché romantic comedy. Different schools, different continents, different people, different places. We literally weathered 100-year storms in foreign lands together, laughing all the while, and still somehow managed not to take the universal romantic hint. The audience surely thought us both the fool.
So, about this picture. It's just perfect. Yeah, we aren't dolled up for camera. Yeah we aren't in dramatic embrace lovingly gazing into one another's eyes. Sure, I see imperfections in myself like most any female human would when a high flash image isn't doctored with some forgiving filter. But it's real. It. Is. So. Real. It's us. Unfiltered. And that is what makes it so amazing. It's who we have wanted to become since small kid time and look! there we are, actualizing all the daydreams of a lifetime. All of them. All the alls.
With profound mutual respect, vigilance, time, consistency, true compassion, patience, a sprinkle of activism, a dash of jumping cliff, (that you've bulked up handsomely from our gangly high school days surely helps), kindness, honesty, honesty, honesty, genuine unconditional love--selfless love without conditions because all you want to see is your best friend happy--with all that, I must say that dreams really do come true.
Standing in love and in solidarity for aloha ‘āina with you, Kainoa is that dream. The dream we've been dreaming. At last. Cheeeeeeehooo! ❤
Photo Credit: Bryan Berkowitz
This much.
Hauʻoli Lā Hānau to my "twin."
All of them ❤︎
As per the mahi'ai mermaiden of Ériu.
Fruits of wholesome labor.
Like real life grown-ups in real life dream-reality.
Because I car(e)(ry) with love.
Without the Russians.
Or the gambling.
Or the guns.
Plus rainbows,
and light beings,
and love.
Here you are my sweet, tender, gorgeous, bad-ass, mermaid-ean, southern belle, island babe, my little crab: hard on the outside but oh so soft on the inside
It's your favorite.
Peering out at you,
underneath the shade of a pareo.
Blue green eyes squinting.
Salty snacks and salty bums.
Coconut oil and coconut wireless...and that coconut syrup.
Tales of excitement and disgust.
Sharing the tiniest, most observant, most poetic,
and romantic details of someones face,
of the way they walk, the way they sleep or breathe.
Long past are the days of iced chai's and sandy's.
Almonds with raisins.
Oranges and gargantuan salads.
Sandy feet in lavender scented trucks.
Acrylics and oils.
Canvasses.
So many canvasses.
Of Chinatown and mopeds.
Evening gowns on city streets.
Kicks with pink laces.
Fire chains spun.
Dance floors destroyed.
Hearts destroyed.
Hair destroyed.
Hopes destroyed.
And rebuilt.
Again.
New lives now.
So different.
Much the same.
It's all still right here, right under the shade of a pareo.
Sun blazing on my skin,
Blue green eyes peering out from underneath.
I see you there.
And it warms my heart.
I am so blessed to have you in my life.
Even when you drop off the face of Planet Earth.
Even then.
You're there.
Elektra.
Whose who?
Nemine already, bumbye da who's of the who goin' get huhū.
Lose money, fo' ack mynah bird kine li' dat.
