Huliau - The Return Voyage

It is impossible to travel as ‘Iokepa Hanalei ‘Imaikalani and I do–from Portland, Oregon to Portland, Maine–from Washington State to Washington, D.C.–and not notice the differences.

I am not speaking about mountains, oceans, rivers, lakes, prairies and deserts.  It’s the human differences:  The face of a place.

I’m speaking of the angles and planes of the human face–and I am speaking of the human temperament of a place.  They are very different.

We are at this moment among the cool, reserved New England faces.  They are lovely and angular; they are comforting to me.   The cerebral greets me well.  These people do not  often wave from  car windows at strangers walking along the lanes.  They don’t speak randomly to one another in urban elevators.  They seem, to both this Hawaiian man and his Jewish wife, contained.

These are not people who are in your face, invading your privacy, or emoting publicly.  I speak this with absolutely no judgment.    The spaces are soothing for me; for ‘Iokepa, I suspect, it is a bit perplexing.

We came here almost directly from Southwest Virginia, where it is virtually impossible to pass a stranger on the street without a conversation that exceeds-by-far a simple greeting:  ‘Iokepa’s comfort zone.  Where the assumption is that humans welcome warmth and the exchange of civility.  The faces are rounder there.

There really aren’t any over-arching ethnic reasons for the difference: a distinct  Scotch-Irish and English mix in both places.  The climates are different.  Here it is cold, indeed, most months of the year.  Caskets sit unburied until spring because the earth won’t accept them.  There, the growing season allows ample time for pumpkins and cantaloupe; the winters are short of adventure or excess.  But summer humidity and temperatures are over-the-top.

I realize that I’m describing stereotypical Yankee-Dixie differences.   We’ve traveled 60,000 car miles in these past three years.  We can speak with feeling about the faces in and of  Idaho or New Mexico, Louisiana or Minnesota.

‘Iokepa carries a billboard of the Hawaiian Islands on his face, in his body, and permeating his emotions.  He has  wide-spaced eyes in a full, but not fleshy face, cheekbones that cannot be ignored;  kanaka maoli splayed feet, enormous calves, and brown skin.

For all the enormous calf and shoulder muscle, these native Hawaiians are soft.  It is how they meet the world:  welcoming,  inclusive.   Only those who’ve been exposed to, and colored by,  the occupying peoples on their Islands behave otherwise.

In truth, both ‘Iokepa and I savor the distinctions.   In more intimate and penetrating climes,  I’m in hiding and ‘Iokepa is well-met.   In more cerebral and reserved places, he is scratching his head and I’m happily doing what I do:  writing alone.

We treasure those differences.  We are excited by the adventure of the next unknown place and face.  That we share.  We share an appreciation for  diversity of every stripe and wrinkle.   And we find ourselves - both of us - in confused opposition to the: ‘All is one’ and ‘All is good ‘ version of reality.

I think we’re closer to: ‘How boring is that?’ and ‘Not all are equally good for me.’

We agree to celebrate the excitement of the unexpected other.  We’re forced every day to do that within our marriage.  And so far, it has worked out just fine.