As my tour of Honolulu’s Chinatown continued, we came upon one of the original tattoo parlors that dotted the area back in the 40s. Sailor Jerry’s iconic creations can be seen in the bottom photo.
Sailor Jerry, aka Norman Collins, was the first tattoo artist to invent a process for creating the color purple to the ire of rivals who followed in his wake. There would be many a U.S. sailor in December of ’41 who received such a tattoo — of his best girl, of a patriotic image, of a port visited or a rank achieved, or maybe the superstitious combo of a chicken and a pig on each foot to prevent that sailor from drowning. There is at least one factual account of a sailor drowning during the Pearl Harbor attack with that tattoo combo. War has no time for superstitions.
We eventually
make our way down to River Street and the canal that runs alongside it. During
the ’40s heyday, this street housed many houses of ill repute. Today, not much
has changed other than the brothels are long gone, replaced by small cafés and
boutique stores catering to the tourist crowd, but nowhere in Chinatown can you
escape the ghosts of the sailors haunting these streets. If you focus your mind
and allow the past to seep in, boisterous laughter, shouts and the odd cat
calls can still be heard. The sex trade hasn’t disappeared altogether though,
for the closer you get to the evening, the odd street walker will pass you on
the sidewalk, dolled up in some kind of skin tight mini dress with 5-inch heels
and gaudy hair and make-up. The dark side of Chinatown still exists, and you
don’t have to look very hard at all to find it.
At the end
of River Street approaching the Honolulu port, there is a very old port
building, the entire structure made from bricks of volcanic rock. There was no
date on the structure but just by looking you knew it had seen sailing ships
dock into port from the 19th century or earlier. My eyes locked on
this building, knowing that it had witnessed all on this island, from the first
spice traders to the smoke clouds of the Japanese attack, and I venture to say it
will outlive us all in the centuries to come.
When I
touched the bricks with their sharp sandpaper affect, they are impenetrable
solid and as new looking as if they had been laid yesterday.
After
gobbling down a kalua pulled pork sandwich — a popular local dish — the tour
ended and I and my new friends went our separate ways. I headed back to Ewa
beach to digest another full day of unfolding history. I’ve said it before but
I mean it. There are ghosts everywhere on this island for me, and none of them
are showing their 77 years. Late teens and 20-somethings with the odd officer
mid thirty’s. If anyone is old here, it’s me, milling among them.
Returning to Ewa, I feel renewed. My beach, my condo, they are restorative places where I can shed for a time the burden of seeing all too well into the past.
Sipping the last of my wine, I take one final look over at Waikiki with its white ribbon of lights, the only signs of life in a coffin-black ocean on a tiny spit of land that holds little me.
This trip is like a precious gem. You’re so thankful you were given the chance to hold it. You know you’ll remember this experience until you die. But there’s a guttural urge to throw the gem as far as you can to let it drown deep in the sea, so you’ll never have to touch it again.
~~~
My first stop would have to be Barker’s Point, as that was the southern-most corner of Oahu the Zeros had to fly around to reach Ewa beach and then the left-hand turn into the Pearl Harbor channel. I did no research on Barker’s Point before I jumped into my rental car that morning, blithely assuming all would be well. As a Canadian, I often forget that Americans look at sites far differently. If there’s no obvious public interest/major profit to be had in protecting/preserving an area, that locale will be lost to the ages and often swallowed up by the dregs of society. The times I’ve got myself into “almost trouble” were the times I was trying to get photos of out of the way American places. You’d think by now, I’d know better. It’s obvious that on this day, I did not.
My first clue should have been that I had to drive and drive and drive through a grimy Industrial Park to even get to Barker’s Point. Nowhere was this early morning road trip pleasant to the eyes or nose. You were far away from the tourist havens of Oahu, let me tell you.
Upon reaching the Point, I immediately spied the lighthouse but knew right away I’d not be able to walk over to it. Yes, Barker’s Point is a public park but it’s been overtaken by drug dealers and drug addicts, the latter having constructed a make-shift shanty town around the public washrooms building.
There was no sign that said I could not park my vehicle and go for a walk on the beach other than my “spidey sense” screaming that my car would be looted and my life would be on the line if I so much as put the car in park and stopped the engine. All I had time to safely do was take a few distanced photos from the front windshield and get the hell out of Dodge, as it were, while the dangerous souls inhabiting this historic site looked at me as predators slobbering at the sight of prey. Yes, one older white chick in a car by herself. Sigh… another close call by B.J. photographing long-forgotten American wonders.
The
Lighthouse was there on December 7th, 1941, but no warning came when
the Japanese fighter planes flew right by. It was Sunday, after all, a
leisurely day on the island, and despite enemy subs seen near Pearl by the USS
Ward, no island-wide warnings were issued. For many days after the 7th,
Barker’s Point was on high alert, with beach sentries and look-outs galore,
soldiers often reporting having spied enemies planes off the coast where there
were none, the paranoia that high that a Japanese land invasion was imminent.
Dangers or not, I was glad I had viewed the Point, just to get a feeling for how exposed the island really was on that southwestern rim. The winds blow constant, this way and that, for at the Point the island gets assaulted in all directions, and regardless of the 21st century drug-addled ruffians, the feeling of vulnerability as you looked out to sea was oh, so clear. 77 years ago, Barker’s Point air carried the enemy planes and the sea held enemy subs, and standing as I did for only a few minutes, the fear of exposure was real.
Maybe it’s Providence that the most vulnerable point in history remains the most vulnerable point today; the Japanese enemy long replaced by drugs and addiction.
Next, I headed onto the H1 and turned north onto highway 93, well out of harm’s ways and back on safe touring ground. Driving has its disadvantages, for it’s hard to drive and take photos. Along the way, I passed an expansive patchwork green of small mixed farms nestled below the Nanakuli mountain range, and on up to the Dole pineapple plantation, its headquarters/parking lots packed with tour buses. The Del Monte plantation is no more, a few years ago being bought out by Dole, but the hundred-year-old pineapple trees swayed slowly back and forth in the sunshine filled breeze.
Then came Wheeler Field and Schofield Barracks, two military installations that got hit hard by the Japanese prior to the Zeros and Kate fighter planes reaching Pearl. The soldiers at Schofield took to machine guns and broke into the arms stores and climbed up to the barrack rooftops, firing with rifles and hand guns, anything they could get their hands on, during the attack, the scene quite well replicated in the 1953 movie, From Here to Eternity, starring Montgomery Clift, Burt Lancaster, Deborah Kerr and Frank Sinatra (Sinatra winning an Academy Award for his performance). The movie came from the well celebrated book written by an ex Schofield soldier turned author, James Jones.
I’ve
attached Google photos here, past and present, of Wheeler and Schofield for your
reference as I wasn’t allowed entry to either site. I tried. I drove in, I hit the
guard shack, I pleaded my case and was told to drive back out... politely but
firmly. I sensed their security paranoia, and after 9/11 and with all the recent
home-grown military grounds attacks, I couldn’t blame them. I felt I didn’t
dare take any curbside photos either. The guard said authors need a permit to
tour, one that can take up to 3 months to receive IF you were granted permission
at all.
It was a
shame, as I so wanted to view the old Quads, the buildings and courtyards where
Eternity was filmed AND where Operation MAGIC was headquartered in a basement
complex inside Schofield, named Station HYPO, where the code breaking machine,
Purple, was housed to decipher Japan’s JN-25 code. Successful decoding
ultimately led to the Allies winning at the battle of Midway that swung the
tide in the allied favor to ultimately win the war in the Pacific.
As for Wheeler, you can see along the highway what’s left of the original 1940s airstrip and hangers, all quite well preserved but still showing their age. The area is a time capsule, really. It wasn’t difficult at all to imagine the fighters over head and the burning planes down below, the smoke, the stench and the helter skelter in warfare.
After driving around the vast
military complex with the original staff cottages still in view, the route on
Kamehameha highway took me right to the extreme western shore and into the
quaint fishing/yachting/tourist village Haleiwa.
It’s a bustling little hamlet of boutique shops, restaurant and surfing shacks catering to the tourist crowd.
Only on the North Shore is it perfectly logical to decorate a surfboard with a Christmas wreath as one would everywhere else a front door.
Once upon a time and for hundreds of years, Haleiwa was a fishing/farming hub for the North Shore, and during the war, the marina was home to more Navy frigates and recon ships than fishing trawlers or tourist yachts.
Today, the marina is back to its peacetime life, populated by various sizes of motorized catamarans and sailing ships, all bobbing up and down before me as I lunched on the lanai at Haleiwa Joe’s Seafood Grill. It was pure heaven to sit back, sip at a rum punch and breathe in the world around me. There are moments in life we all have that are treasured. This day and this vista was one for me.
My next
stop was the famous Banzai Pipeline. December is competition month, as the
waves are at their more violent, and I mean violent. My photos do not do them
justice, for you’re talking 20 foot waves crashing in with such force the
lifeguards shoo all tourists back from walking directly on the beach, for to be
swept out into them could cost a layman his life. On this day, only one brave
kanaka ventured forth, and it took all he had to fight the incoming waves to
board out to make a single run, we onlookers gasping for breath as several
times it looked like the Hawaiian surfer would be taken off his board and out
to sea and to his death. The competition was ultimately shut down for the day,
the sea being too stormy even for the diehards who had flown in from all over
the world to compete.
From
dunes some 40 feet high, I took these photos. It was a warm, pleasant day on
shore but “growling tigers” in the sea. When each wave landed, it sounded like
two colliding freight trains. You were made deaf to all other sounds and your
insides literally reverberated from the hits.
My final stop for the day would be Kahuku Point. It was the first spit of land the Japanese fighter planes spied on that early December morn. A constant northwesterly wind buffeted the coast. From about halfway up the North Shore to the Point, the winds never cease. It’s a completely different world, just as tropical but Mother Nature is far less forgiving.
I couldn’t
get close to shoreline for a golf course stood in the way but even at a
distance you could see how the incessant winds warped the trees.
The photograph taken behind the shore is Kahuku Point itself where the radar installation stood in December 1941 that signalled the warning of a mass of Japanese fighter planes heading for Oahu that no one up the chain of command took seriously. Oahu should have been an impenetrable island if only the Americans had respected their foe.
I stopped my tour at the Point. I had planned to drive right around the island that day but fearing I’d end up in H1 freeway traffic hell on the return, I chose instead to go back the way I came, to visit the eastern side of the island the next day. It was this northwestern tour that meant the most to me, regarding the book, for I clapped eyes on the route the Japanese fighters took, to view a paradise they were determined to destroy, not only physically but emotionally, and forever in many minds. Oahu is a dichotomy, of glorious beauty and excruciating sorrow. The mix is hard to take, but it’s always there in the back of your mind – the Beauty and the Beast of war.
~~~
My Hawaii research trip was fast coming to a close. This was my second to last day on this beautiful isle.
By now, I felt at home. I had mastered the harried H1 freeway with its 10 lanes, and locals allowed to drive on the shoulder lanes at rush hour, making it a 12 lane nightmare (from here on out, I would never again bemoan Calgary freeways). Between my nose for direction and Google maps I drove with confidence and felt fairly relaxed. I was at home with my WWII ghosts as I and they toured about.
In AIR,
there is a scene at Halona Cove, the tiny beach hideaway situated on the south-eastern
shore of Oahu. It’s known for its great blow-hole and nestled beach, a tiny spit
of sand and surf only dare devils or history searchers venture to reach.
As I sped
along the H1 and then onto Kalaniana’ole Highway to reach the other side of
Diamond Head, I passed lovely coastal suburbs like Kaimuki and
Waialae and Koko Head, bedroom communities rather removed from Honolulu’s hustle-bustle.
In my week-long travels, it was when I was away from the tourist zones that I
felt most at home, and got the best sense of what it would have been like
living on this isle as a sailor in the 1040’s — a hybrid of visitor and lengthy
dweller — a unique existence.
On my way, I
passed under Koko Head Crater. The majesty of this island never fails
to amaze. You always knew you were standing on what was a very violent volcanic
range, giant eruptions of gelled lava bursting through the middle of the
Pacific Blue, and vistas like this brought that reality rushing home.
Everything on Oahu seemed bigger — in life and in death — the violent end of
one thing making way for a burst of life in another.
The Halona
Blow Hole was a sight to see. You heard the blow hole before you
ever saw it. That millennia of pounding waves had carved out of the cement-hard
volcanic rock a deep channel that culminated in the watery blowback buffeting untold
gallons of water into an aerosolized mist. Your ears pounded with the rhythmic
thunder. The air was warm and laden with moisture. It was as if you were
standing in God’s sauna.
A few brave
souls ventured out onto the craggy ledges to fish, as the monstrous
waves crashed in. The freight train like deafening sound as the water broke,
the sheer force of nature, had your innards vibrate as you stood staring at
these diehards in disbelief. The mid Pacific is a moody girl in December with
her blustery winds and choppy white-crested waves. Sun tanning on the calmer beaches
of Oahu had you forget for a time the ocean’s might. The eastern shore soon
reminded you.
The Pacific’s blue hue is eye-popping when viewed from Hawaii. I don’t know if it’s because you’re away from North American air pollution or hundreds of miles away from any other landmass but the sea here is alive with colour, more so than I ever witnessed in all my times visiting California’s coast.
Looking further up island along the north-eastern shore, I viewed Sandy Beach, the first decent stretch of sand amid the volcanic outcroppings. The eastern side of Oahu is like the island’s North Shore, a wild and woolly state that holds an untouched beauty all its own. A visitor breathes better along these far-flung shores free of tourist trade and development. Rough. Ready. Real. I felt a close kinship to locales where the wind and waves are feral, so it was no surprise to me that one of AIR’s pinnacle scenes would occur here.
American Author and WWII army vet, James Jones, set a scene here, too, in his iconic novel, From Here to Eternity. There was no way I could write AIR and not pay homage to the man, his celebrated novel and this fierce land that art and history have called home.
I purposely left visiting Halona Cove until my last full day on Oahu, mostly because I knew the emotion in me would run high viewing this spot. I wanted these overwrought feelings to last, to be one of the final experiences I packed into my mind’s suitcase.
As I parked my car alongside the highway, I inhaled deeply as I slowly made my way to the spot that would become the heart of my novel, the place and its moment in my tale that I would hold so dearly until the day I died. Some life encounters are that monumental. You know it even before you live it, and when you’re right in the mix, you appreciate its significance all the more. It’s a heady human experience. Time speeds up and slows to a trickle. You fight to record in your mind’s eye every single second, every single sensory affect — the sight, the sound, the scent, the touch. I knew I was about to walk in the footsteps of others, 77 years hence, as I had been doing everywhere I went since I landed. Each step became more phenomenal than the last, each carrying more emotional weight.
The tourists surrounding me, I saw they weren’t as phased. Many wouldn’t be aware of the significance of this spot, yet a few were. I could tell the difference in them. Those who knew behaved differently.
I finally reached the guard rail and looked over. This is my first sight of Halona Cove from its southern side, the side opposite the well-trodden trail that heads down to the tiny spit of land directly below the highway.
This is the view the Hollywood cameras shot when actors, Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr, meandered down the path in the movie version of Jones’s book. The book came out in 1951, the movie in 1953, some 67 years before I trod the exact same path.
My mind asked so many questions: Why am I here? Why does it take close to 70 years before my soul meets this moment? Why does it matter? Does it matter? Do the dead know I’m here?
The only
disembodied response that my mind heard as a whisper: It matters. You stop asking questions. You can tell God or Fate or the
dead won’t let you in on any more tidbits of wisdom.
The
southern side I had first looked over, one could jockey
your way down. I saw a few do it. But it’s not the real path. It’s a vertical wall
of sharp black volcanic rock layered at a very steep angle. In this photo, I am
standing at the trail head. It took me a few tries to find the entrance to the
path as it’s hidden by roadside foliage and is over the highway guard rail.
Neither way down is for the faint of heart, but nothing was going to keep me
from stepping foot on this cove. I would breathe in the love scene locale of From
Here to Eternity even if it killed me. Young guys in their 20s hopped down the
rock out-cropping in nothing flat. Older people were in couples, where one
would help the other. I was the odd person out — alone and older. It never
entered my mind I wouldn’t make it. I forgot to tell my knees and lungs about
that fact.
The trail photo does not justify the angle nor the height nor how much space there was between one safe stepping stone to the next. There was nothing to hang onto. You just hoped your breath and knees would hold out. Twenty feet down of the 80 or so to go, my lungs were empty and my knee caps were throbbing. I thought I had lost my marbles attempting this trek.
But what am I going to do? Stop? Retreat? Hell no!
Up above
there were about 30-50 people looking down, but as you can see from these
photos only a few attempted to reach the cove. Heck, even Lancaster and Kerr
were 40 and 32 respectively when they trod this trail, and I’m 54 with no
handsome and burly actor to help me down. Writers are a weird bunch. The stuff
we’ll do to get a story.
With a
bucket-full of luck and body determination, and maybe a little help from
ghosts, I finally reached the sandy shore.
The sound from the pounding waves crashing into the tiny inlet bombarded my ears every15-20 seconds or so. Noise from up above — the sound of people talking or the sound of cars — it was all happily drowned out, and you felt as if you were the only person on the island, and only this moment mattered.
Here in
Halona Cove, I left the real world and wandered into the past, as I had done so
many times before in so many places in these last seven days. It was 1941 and I
was alive to witness it for myself. In reality, it would be another 23 years
before I’d truly be born, but linear time for me was moot on Oahu. Although I
didn’t look back at the highway once I reached the sand, I think if I had, all
the cars would have been 1940’s models, all the women would have donned bright
red lipstick and all the men would have worn hats and smoked pipes or Lucky
Strikes. The experience of leaving my time and entering theirs, the WWII
generation, felt that real.
After a moment’s hesitation — for I wondered if treading right on the past might break the spell — I approached the spot in the movie where Lancaster embraced Kerr in the crashing waves, the exact spot in the sand. In my mind, the intensity of that romantic moment still lingered there. I saw the ghostly image of the two on-screen lovers as wave upon wave crashed over them, the watery in and out, the ebb and flow. I stood staring for some time, thoughts stilled, senses on over-drive.
The significance of this spot wasn’t merely because of a Hollywood movie but because of the emotion impending war brings to all mankind. Time, in war, is the most precious entity — there’s never enough and it’s running out fast — so, humans fight to hold onto every single second of life, every single moment of love expressed. The emotion displayed by Lancaster/Kerr in that love scene are symbolic of every man and woman in those heady days of WWII. You loved and laughed as much as you could, for fear, death and sorrow may soon darken your door.
As I stared down at the powder-fine sand and frothing waves, tears welled and purled down my cheeks. Their salty liquid mixing with the sea below. I quick looked up to see if anyone was watching me. No one was, thank God, so I let the tears flow and pelt the sand and wash out with the receding waves. Now, a part of me had mixed with the past, those men and women on the cusp of war, people who could love today who maybe dead tomorrow, and they and I floated forward into our fates… From Here to Eternity.
Sorrow and joy, joy and sorrow.
It had been an incessant see-saw set of emotions for me on Oahu.
Soon, my mind’s eye left the past and seeped back to the present. It was a jarring effect, and I was never quite sure if I was happy to return. I looked around for a spot to sit, to breathe in the place. Directly up the beach, I spied a boulder whose shape was that of an upright recliner. I walked the dozen or so steps, plunked down my bag, unfurled my beach towel, kicked off my sandals, and…
I sat a spell, looking out to sea… listening, watching, smelling, being, sifting the warm sand through my fingers… the experience: as if my mind was luxuriating in the warmest whirlpool —contentment, sheer contentment — the kind of personal joy not to be described, only experienced, but you know it when it occurs. I’ve had that perfect kind of feeling only about three times in my life, and this was one, where if life ended for me right this very second, it would be okay. Fate carried me here. I worked at nourishing the journey, but it was Fate which opened the door and showed me the way. People who diligently work a Bucket List will miss Fate’s role in their lives, and they will be at a loss for it. Let Fate be your guide. Sometimes it knows better for you than you ever will.
About an hour or so later, I saw the sun angling into the late afternoon and I knew it was time to leave. I had wanted to drive up the eastern shore, all the way to Kahuku Point as I had done on my drive up the North Shore, but my energy was ebbing like an outgoing tide. The week had been wonderful but so busy from dawn ‘til dusk. I was losing the physical ability to do more. I resigned myself to abandoning that drive. I was saddened about my decision but I knew I needed to be alert to navigate the rush hour back on the H1 freeway. Being a solo traveller has its drawbacks. In the past, it was much easier for me to be a passenger than a driver. Energy lasts longer that way.
I knew I had time enough to visit the Punchbowl Cemetery one final time, so I shook out my towel, gathered a bunch of Halona Cove sand into an empty water bottle and I made the upwards trek along the tricky path back to my car. I was sad to leave. It was hard to pull myself away. If life were perfect, I would have remained in that cove for all time. Maybe now a part of me lies there still. Maybe now my spirit haunts that sandy lagoon with the ghosts of others. Maybe now I’m truly a part of the past.
As I made my way back into Honolulu, I felt as a local, driving back up to that crater cemetery, no longer needing directions. High up above the city, nestled in God’s arms, I returned to the most peaceful place I knew on earth. This would be my last attempt to try and find the graves of the real sailors lost aboard the USS Oklahoma, trying two times in the last 7 days, each time not having any luck. I knew the DPAA USS Oklahoma Project had disinterred many of the sailors buried in the “UNKNOWNS” graves to finally identify remains through familial DNA, so I feared my search would be in vain, yet I knew after being identified some of the dead were returned to the Punchbowl as per the family wishes, so one last try, I whispered to myself… one last try…
I knew generally where the Okie boys were laid to rest: the right hand side in the lower section as you drive through the cemetery gates. I parked my car on the circular drive up above that area. It had just rained or misted up there. The air was moist and the grass was wet, but the sun still shone strong and warmth surrounded me. Row upon row, column after column, I walked into the zone. The grass on many gravestones had grown over the location I.D. and I knew I had to find section P. In random attempts, I’d brush back dirt, wet grass, dead leaves and twigs to locate the right section. I would find P numbers but none from the Okie. A half hour spent and again no luck. Not one gravestone found.
With tears threatening, I whispered, Where are you? You’re here, I know you’re here. But where are you? Help me, guys. Help me find you. A gentle breeze flew through the monkey pod and tamarind trees, a whispering hiss was the reply.
When you’re in the middle of that volcanic crater, no outside noise can you hear. The outside is a world apart. Nature is the only on-site caretaker. It’s just you and the resting souls. A beautiful place of refuge.
I looked and looked, practically walking in circles now. The sun was setting lower in the sky and I knew my time was running low. I steeled myself. I began to swallow the fact that maybe flying all this way to meet the real sailors of BB-37 was a lost cause. That fact stuck in my throat — a mix of frustration and sadness. I slowly walked back up the slight incline to my car. I felt so empty. How could I write AIR without talking to these men? I needed to talk to them. Maybe I wanted their permission to write. Maybe that was a silly thought but I needed to talk with them. And now, on this, my final try, I had to leave, and a part of me feared that I may never return in my life time to try and find them again. In all the time working on this project, I never felt as lonely and empty as I did at this moment.
Then… something caught in the corner of my eye… a word, a damn familiar one: PEARL. I looked to my left. Top, right hand corner, P1003. P section! I scanned the inscription.
JOHN EDWIN SAVIDGE
USS OKLAHOMA
S1C US NAVY
PEARL HARBOR
PURPLE HEART
NOV 6 1921 DEC 7 1941
I found one! I found one of my boys! I was beyond elated.
Quickly, I scanned the immediate area as I knelt next to Mr. Savidge, and sure enough, five more graves were right around me! That made six! Six sailors from the Okie, just like in my epic AIR. I couldn’t believe my eyes. I scanned further but there were only these six like Fate had planned it that way. The stones looked new and one only had a temporary placard. It was obvious they had been reinterred after the DNA identification. A vibration in the air, a welcome heaviness like that from the warmth of a heavy farm quilt cloaked me, and although I cannot prove it, I knew I was no longer alone. It was the same feeling I felt when visiting the white marble stanchions at the Oklahoma Memorial on Ford Island. I was with them and they saw me, and their past and my present met and mingled.
I plunked down onto the grass and cried. I just cried and cried and cried. This time, I didn’t care if anyone saw me. It was my release, a letting go of those men and my late parents, the generation who worked so hard and sacrificed so much for their Baby Boomer kids. The feelings of loss had been so heavy for so long, but with each sob, each gulp of air, my soul unburdened and lifted higher. My tears pelted the blades of grass and mixed with the dew, and in my mind’s eye these six sailors were comforting me, not me comforting them. After a time, once I could catch my breath, I whispered out in choking gulps, I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. You didn’t deserve any of this. And in my mind’s eye they nodded and smiled, and we began to talk. I told them all about the book and my journey to Oahu. I told them about my father and my mother and why I needed to write this book, for them, for my parents, and for me.
Time flew by. In those precious moments, I felt like those men had given their okay for me to write their tale. One reply, I heard. In a stern and sober disembodied voice, the words: Do it right. I nodded earnestly. I promised those men I’d give it my all.
The tree shadows were growing long and God was cloaking the crater in darkness. It was time for the souls to sleep. I knew I had to leave. I touched their stones for the final time and whispered a thank you and a goodbye. I returned to my car and before I started the engine, I looked down at my hands and saw dirt under my nails. I had literally clawed my way to those men. Here in this final photo are the six located graves, a photo of the Punchbowl cenotaph and my fingers. I sat in the car for a while to collect myself and then I slowly drove out the gates for the final time, this time, with a light but full heart.
The entire week, I had been living in a wonder state where time was inconsequential and moments I would cherish for the rest of my life came and coursed through my veins as life-giving blood.
On my last
full day on Oahu, on my final try, the Okie boys and I met, and now truly
everything was okay.
~~~
My final day on Oahu.
Twenty-four episodes in total, two years’ worth of posts, and my Oahu, Hawaii research trip for the Pearl Harbor literary novel, AIR, was fast coming to a close.
I woke that morning with a calm that had washed over, and remained with me, the last eight days. I was filled with promise despite being utterly, physically exhausted. And although I knew it was time to go home and get to work to finish the book, a quiet sadness lingered.
It would be the last time I’d hear my Ewa Beach bugle player play Reveille at 730 a.m.
It would be the last time F22’s soared over-head in the bright morning sun.
Alarm clocks on Ewa are a strange and wondrous thing.
As they had all week, the palms outside my loft swayed lazily in the breeze. One looked like a dragon to me (palm inside purple line). Every morning, he’d nod at me and swooshed a, “Good Morning, Barbie.” I knew I’d miss Doug. Yes, Doug Dragon. Stop snickering. Yes, my dragon buddy was a man; and although there were so many incredible female souls on this island, then as now, my time had been mostly shared with men — young and old, poor and posh, living, and most especially the dead. My mind was set adrift upon this isle, and I floated aloft on the strength of men.
I had planned that my last day be a leisurely one. No more rushing here, zooming there. No more studying this or memorizing that. I had made 27 sites in 7 days, and I was done, mentally and physically. No, today, I would act as a tourist, a traveller who relished a lazy day on the beach. To act and be, to dive all senses into a place I feared I may never see again.
Yes. In the back of my mind, I sensed this might be my one and only trip. Of course, I can’t know that for sure… but something in me… a niggling, whispered thought, Take in all that you can, Barbie, for you might never be this way again.
I shrugged off that melancholy thought, rose from my soft linen sheets and made breakfast — bakery-fresh Hawaiian buns and pineapple jam and North Shore brewed coffee and orange juice. I doubt I could be happier if I tried.
Little things stuck with me on that trip, like the cupboard door knobs in my loft. I thought, Got to get me some of these bubblicious beauts when I get home. Of course, I haven’t acquired. Not that I couldn’t. But once you’re back home in Canada, some yearnings fall away. Maybe seeing, experiencing new things is good enough. Maybe owning is not the goal. Maybe life is a collection of experiences that you cannot share nor fully explain. You just live through said and enjoy for the time you’re here on earth and breathe air.
Writing these posts has been an emotional ride. I smile, I laugh, I linger on some photos, and tears fall. But isn’t that what life’s like after all? Isn’t that the measure of a life well lived? Maybe it’s never been about the amount of time or the accumulation of things. Maybe it’s always been about the ride, and how deeply you feel as you hang on around the fierce corners. A part of me is content that this is the last research journey post just like a part of me was content that this was my last day in paradise. Today, I would rejoice and relish in each moment. These are the things I pondered at my breakfast table in my hideaway loft on a strip of beach called Ewa.
I had well-prepared myself the afternoon before. I decided it would be cocktails upon cocktails by the beach, and there was one I had to taste before I left — Kona’s Longboard Beer.
My characters would drink a similar brew in AIR. And I and they could not part until we’d all have a swig or several. (I brought the cardboard container home. It’s my napkin holder now. Every time I reach for it, I smile, and I remember.)
Today would be a day of noticing
the little things…
Like flipping through a tourist magazine and coming across a retro advertisement for Pan Am airlines. Gosh, I hadn’t thought of that company in ages. Looking at the ad made me grin. Maybe I linger too long on all things old and gone, and no era is realistically better than another, but some things for me seem sweeter, representing a more innocent time. All generations experience cultural growing pains. No generation is immune to innocence lost. But this picture took me back… before airport security, before passengers dressing casual, before lousy airplane food and 3rd class service, before planes being taken hostage and before in-flight fear. The only lesson to be learned for all: cherish your Now, while you can, for you’ll never know when it will die.
After breakfast, I got into a
bathing suit, grabbed a beach towel and my drinks cooler, my shades and my
camera to head to the beach and just Be. Along my path, a floral parade was at
my feet. No matter where you looked on Oahu, perfection permeated and excited the
senses.
Bird of Paradise, Plumeria, Kapu,
variegated Croton and Bougainvillea hedges grow like weeds even in the resting
month of December. The scent was heavy, mixing well with the salty ocean air.
Arriving at my private beach,
I find another perfect day in paradise. I imagine locals can have bad days, but
one wonders how. The to and fro, swoosh and ploosh sound of the rocking ocean
never ends and overloads your hearing, blocking out everything else. By now, I
felt right at home. I felt like a local. In eight short days. I experienced an
odd feeling, like I was home, or this was my home, and yet there was no yearn
for actual ownership, as if this spit of volcanic land belonged to all of us for
millennia like some kind of origin story where we humans crawled out of the
ocean to inhale our first breaths and take their first steps... right here, on
this very beach. An innate part of me felt like I was meant to be here, if only
my stay boiled down to mere hours.
Honolulu, Waikiki and Diamond Head sparkled in the distance. It was a great day everywhere you looked.
All that washed ashore was a whisper inside my head, I’m alive. Such a great day to be alive. I wasn’t the first nor the last to think such things. I was just my turn. The sailors, nurses and doctors at Pearl Harbor had whispered the same 77 years ago. We all have our turn at life’s wondrous helm.
Above me, the palm fronds swished and hissed… and errant clouds that wafted in over the western Pacific floated by and winked a hello.
A sip of Kona Longboard — my-my,
a smooth brew — and a nibble from Hawaiian made potato chips. Yummy.
I lay back and soaked up the
sun and let my mind float along with the gentle breeze, and I whiled away the
afternoon until the shadows grew longer in my tiny spot of perfection, in my
tiny amount of time. I think back and my senses replay the effect. Even now, as
my brain wanders back, I stop typing… my mind draws a contented blank and I
breathe... no need for thinking at all. In my short stint on this Blue Marble,
I’ve been so many places and experienced so many things that as I gaze out any
window, anywhere, I’m never sure where I truly am or where I’m going. Memory and
imagination are wonderful carpet rides.
The war canoes paddled by as they did most afternoons. A choppy December sea demanded immense upper boady strength.
And on this final day, an airplane zipped by, a hint that my own departure was soon.
Heavier clouds formed and
Oahu’s rain — the daily rainbow mist — cloaked Honolulu in its warm, moist blanket,
the vista fadding, ghosting out, the sight dying before my eyes like the
falling of a theater curtain when the play is over. Oahu was gently saying her
goodbyes to me, and tears welled and purled down my cheeks. I knew I had to say
goodbye to her and to my six sailors, the men who had lived in my mind for so very
long. They would remain on the island. I knew when I carried my characters onto
the island they would never live in Calgary again. They belonged with the real
Pearl Harbor sailors now. I would fly home alone, with only my father’s pipe
and my mother’s pen.
The day
quietly and peacefully slipped by, and as I padded back to my loft, I turned
around to gaze on the path I’d not take again, and at my rental Nissan that had
sped around the entire island for me like a trusty steed. In the trees, beyond
view, lay the owner’s house, a one level on stilts affair. They would remain on
the island like my car, like everything here but me. A slow dissection was occurring
— me pulling away from everything there. A soft sadness cloaked me but it wasn’t
harsh nor heavy. I knew I was leaving “home” to go home. A strange dual pull.
My final photo on Ewa Beach. The palm frond waving a slow goodbye. In my imagination, I heard men’s and women’s voices whispering… nurses and doctors who stayed on Ewa in December of 1941, the armed guards who patrolled this beach for many days and nights after the attack, and off to my left gentle kisses from my boys at Pearl. Then was melting into Now, and it truly was time to go.
The loft tidied, the car packed, and a long note of thanks to the owners. Everywhere I turned, I was grateful and felt so blessed. It was my last drive out of the lazy and laid back Ewa Beach neighborhood. I whispered a goodbye to my unseen bugler friend, and zoomed I went past all the bedroom communities, past Pearl City and the harbor. It was good that I couldn’t take my eyes off the road for long, for saying bye to Pearl Harbor sent a dagger pain into my heart. In my mind’s eye, my six characters stood aboard the Okie, the ghost battleship unhurt, all waving goodbye. I dropped the car off to the rental agency. Even seeing the car for the last time made me sad.
I shuttled to the airport and grabbed something to eat…
… and a great research book I bought in the gift shop to read along the way. It would be a long red-eye non-stop ahead, and then I would be home. My home. My time. The final writing of AIR would begin.
The journey, finally, happily, ends.
If all goes well on this Blue Planet, look for AIR to be released December 7, 2021.