Waimanalo for Christmas

For Christmas, the boys got airplanes and puzzles, and some books on bugs and rocket ships. (Can you really go wrong there?)

And we finally got a few rain-free days. Lately, about the last month, we’ve all been either trapped inside while it poured outside, or trying to walk the dog in the pouring rain. (She will NOT walk in the rain. She slinks along beside us wondering why in the world anyone, but especially her family, insists upon dragging her out in this horrendous weather. Then, after infuriating her people by doing nothing the whole walk, and getting taken back home, she jumps up excitedly whenever someone moves towards the door as if to say, “FINALLY someone will take me outside!! And probably if they take me out the front door instead of the back door like last time it won’t be raining over there!”)

So for a month we’ve been playing that game. Pretty fun, huh?

But the Saturday before Christmas was finally nice, and we hadn’t been to Waimanalo in a couple months, so to make up for all the days we’d had to stay inside looking through the windows, we went down south twice, once in the morning, back home for naps, and back down afterwards.

After all, nothing lasts; not the humpback whales in these Hawaiian waters, not the sun flashing on the heavy winter waves. So we all ran up the trails on the way to the Waimanalo lighthouse and eagerly scanned the ocean for the migrating humpbacks before they move on again to the luscious waters, heavy with fish beside Alaska.

And we took pictures of little people that are rapidly getting bigger, because in fact, every day is the littlest they’ll ever be again, and every next day they speak a few more words, they learn a few more things, they eat a little more for breakfast.

For that one day, the sunshine even lasted to the afternoon, so we landed on Waimanalo beach, the waves a little big for little boys, but there had been just enough rain somewhere to catch the sun in color, and Hawaii became the stuff of the postcard picture books that everyone comes to Hawaii looking for.

These days, in their beauty and their shortness, remind us that every day is the same; full of moments we won’t get back. (And a good thing in the bad moments!)

The next minute, the next moment, will be different again and again. So blink quickly and look again, remember, and let it go.