Entries this day: Dream Lava Rain_swim

Dream

5:05am HST Thursday 13 February 2003

I had to get up to go pee, and I figured I could just go back to the little bathroom and pee but when I got there it had no walls, so I used a sleeping bag to cover me while I was there. But there was no way to hang the sleeping bag from the ceiling anymore, and I was surprised that I hadn't thought this through a bit more completely; when I got up to pee it seemed like everything would go smoothly, that all conditions were accounted.

Once I was there, some guys were sitting near a stack of firewood discussing grades in their college classes. One cat was talking on a cell phone telling his friend on the other end of the conection how the school the friend was attending was a really difficult school in history so he should feel fine about geting a 3.5 in history class, but the friend pointed out that he was going to school for history and therefore he should get a better grade in that class than all the others.

I just looked at the shapes of the logs of firewood and wondered if they were all different lengths or if they were just stacked not lined up. I could only see one end of the logs as they were stacked.

One guy asked me what I was looking at and I told him and he was all, "no really, what are you looking at?" as if I could not possibly be thinking about firewood lengths.

Lava

9:11am HST Thursday 13 February 2003

Kimberly said that seeing the lava on the big island (Hawaii), which is the largest and least populated, is quite worth the price and 40 minute hike. I wonder if I can do that hike barefoot. She said flip flops were all she used. Hmmmmmm.

Rain swim

2:17pm HST Thursday 13 February 2003

So, there are thistles on Hawaii. I got some in my feet on the way back from swimming. I barely missed going to yoga with Janette and Reenie; Janette left a note, so it seems I probably got here 15 minutes after they left. I didn't really care about yoga, but I do want to meet this cat who teaches it; Reenie said he channels astrological readings and tarot amazingly well. Cool beans, it sounds like to me.

But I'll just be like Mike the Man from Mars and be content with knowing I'll meet the guy when the time is right.

After mailing off my postcards, save two (one actual Hawaii postcard to Wende to make sure the free advertisment-postcard from San Francisco gets to her first, and one to Karen cause I dated it 14 February), I decided to go swimming in the rain. I figured no better technique to get wet than to get wet two different ways at the same time. At first it was cold, but I got used to it.

Walked along the beach and saw in the not so far away distance some waves crashing boldly on some rocks that stick out from shore. I made that point my goal. I wasn't able to rock hop very quickly, since everything was wet, even the rocks that don't (often) get wet from the ocean; I could really only rock walk, stepping carefully to ensure I didn't come back with scars.

Made it to the start of those rocks and discovered they were pretty slick enough that I had to be really careful walking on them, and sometimes was on all fours like Golem, except not as skinny. Scared a couple of crabs, a fish, and touched one of the brown with little white spots water slug things, eeeeekk!! It was like an old warm cucumber that slowly slugged away from where I touched it. With some delicate balancing, I made it out to the outermost point of rocks. They sorta made a 3/5 pi arc out into the water. I wanted to complete the arc instead of coming back the way I had come and found myself sorta stuck, having run out of rocks that remained visible at all times.

I'd wait for the wave to go by, then step down into the water and back up to the next visible rock. Another wave, step down, step up. Then I ran out of rocks that were visible at all. A slight backtrack gave me a few more feet, but not much help cause they were parallel to shore.

I stepped onto rocks that were always covered in water; I could barely see them because mud from the shore was being washed by the rain into this small bay. Then I noted I could see no more rocks at all. The next step was into a visual void that I knew had rocks at the bottom, all of various heights and sharpness and organic coverage. I realized I was scared. I'm afraid, why am I afraid, why am I a slave to this trade, cyanide I spit to the grave, good enough to rile you up, you want me to flip it, I can rip it any style you want. Fine. I'm afraid. I can either sit here and be afraid or go go go. What's the worst that could happen? Slice my foot open? Fine. I won't die. Let's go.

So I sat down on my rock, lowering my feet into the opaque water. Felt rocks about 3 feet deep. Fine. Step, step, step. "Rabbit Run" lyrics in my head to focus on something else.

Some days I just wanna up and call it quits step step I feel like I'm surrounded by a wall of .... rocks stub ow fuck step up onto a rock everytime I go to get up I just step have to use my hands to keep balance fall in pits my life's like one great big water pushes me over and I stub the fuck out of my toe, trying to keep balance, splashing backward frantically to stay upright and not have to put my hands into the unknown bowl of cherries.

Fuck this style of writing. Short version is that I almost ate shit a couple of times and rocky terrain varied from waist deep to shin deep without warning and finally near the end of the song I was on all fours again cause I was near the shore and could see the rocks and then triumphantly stepped up onto the usually-dry rocks on shore as I recited if I have half a chance I grab it and I lost balance and had to rotate 180 degrees and step down and then sideways and then got stable again rabbit run.

Four paw drive up the rocks to the street level. I ran down the half asphalt, half pothole street that would have been hellaciously painful many times if I had stepped into the potholes containing opaque puddles full of rocks and craggly asphalt. Even worse would be to step halfway into a pothole, where asphalt would have a good chance to shred the arch of my foot. It was only slightly painful stepping on basically flat asphalt as I hit only some small rocks with my tenderized feet. Spitting "Rabbit Run" lyrics again, spitting not cause I was reciting them quickly, but because it was still raining quite effectively and I had water pouring down my face, I ran for a while on the asphalt, basically avoiding the painful stuff. Had to slow down for a bit and then ran again when I got to some grass.

That's when I discovered thistles do live in Hawaii.

Ow fuck fuck fuck; I tried to keep running, but couldn't override the stabbing pain each time I stepped. Many of the stickers didn't make it through my callouses, but those that got the tip of my toes or that soft skin between the pads of my toes and my feet... yeowza!! I pulled them out, got thistles in my fingers, pulled them out, stepped again, got more thistles, fuck. I somehow made it out and got basically everything cleared out of my footses and ran most of the rest of the way home on the asphalt street. This portion of street was new and flat with some rocks on it.

Back to the hostel and saw the car was missing. Sigh. I missed meeting this yoga cat. But..... it's alll good in Hawaii.

5:13pm HST

Janette got the yoga guy's card and he said he'd be glad to do a reading for us. Sweet.