From Agita to Aloha

I'm having a hard time getting started with this post. I want to fill you in on the past few weeks, which have seen me moving to a new apartment and shopping for furniture to fill said apartment and flying Mom out to Seattle to help with said shopping and working on some big auditions and finishing my assistant teaching gig and…a lot has happened. And my new apartment is awesome. I want to tell you all about it. I want to fill you in on all the details of Mom's visit and the fabulous reading chair she helped me pick out. I want to tell you about the auditions and the callbacks and the preparations for upcoming auditions. I really do want to share it all with you.

But I'm having a hard time focusing on the past few weeks. Because as I write this, I am lounging on a lanai (that's "porch" for those of you who don't speak Hawaiian) and watching the green-blue waves of the Pacific crash into the shore some 100 yards from my feet. The palm trees are swaying in a cool breeze and the breeze smells of flowers and coconut. Or perhaps I'm just smelling the freshly chopped coconuts that are sitting on the table next to me. If I care to stand up and walk to the end of the lanai and look to the south, there is a waterfall pouring off of a jungle cliff, its mists mingling with the blackened sky above until they settle back into cloud cover. Every few minutes, a rooster crows (seems these islands are chock full of chickens as chickens have no natural predators here), and at some point during the day, I should get a visit from a Black Lab named Iko Iko who wears a collar saying "PLEASE DO NOT FEED". Now really, how am I supposed to be focused enough on February's furniture shopping to turn my thoughts from my present surroundings? And truthfully, I don't think you'd want me to leave paradise for even a moment, am I right? I'll be back in Seattle in a week and I will gladly give you a photo tour of our new Room with a View (just so you know, the view is similar to our last place, only bigger!) and tell you all about my developing life there. Today, however, is a perfect day to be living in the moment. Aloha from Kaua'i. And mahalo for reading.