Warm greetings all.
In previous posts I've expressed how the present version of my life falling apart, disintegrating, dissolving, and how, with so much rapid shifting, changes, and uncertainty, that I feel half uprooted, between worlds, and quite ungrounded as of late.
One of the big changes was that my beloved, , moved out of the intentional community where we first connected, and where we lived together, very closely, for almost 8 months. I've lived in this off-grid jungle community for over 3 years now, she lived there for a bit over a year.
Last week, a mutual friend in the community, Sundog, and I helped her move to her new place down on the Red Road, in Seaview. This several miles from where she had been living, and where I still remain. One notable factor in this is that neither of us own a car presently.
Yesterday, Saturday, I got a lift down to the Red Road, to spend some the weekend with my love. She was going to be busy with a promotional videography project until around 4PM, so when I got dropped off in the area, I chose to go to Kehena, one of my favorite beaches in the world. Kehena is a much loved local community black-sand beach that has been clothing-optional since 1955. I was taken here an hour after I first landed on the Big Island, and I've been in love with it ever since.
I arrived around 1PM, and found a nice spot for my blanket and stuff. The day was exceptionally beautiful. The perfect day for the beach. The water for very calm (quite uncommon for Kehena) and glass-like.
Just a few minutes after I sat down on my blanket, a coconut fell from a coconut palm behind me, and rolled right onto my blanket, right next to me. A group of people next to me saw this happen, and one of the women said that it was very fortuitous. One of the fellows offered me a knife to open it. It is much easier to open a coconut with a machete than a knife, but I made it work. It was a damn good coconut, too.
Multiple synchronicities abound that day. One notable one was when a couple with a baby behind me remembered me as the one who has given them a tour of the intentional community where lived then, I still live. At the time I gave them the tour, the young woman had just had a miscarriage, and was still in quite a bit of grief. I gave them an ayahuasca (Banisteriopsis caapi) and a chakruna (Psychotria viridis) plant to take with them, which they planted in commemoration of the baby they lost. It was really wonderful to see that they did have another baby, a girl, since I had seen them last.
Two of the other quite spectacular things that occurred that day was that dolphins were jumping and twisting and flipping out of the water the whole time I was there. Dolphins come to Kehena quite often, but this was an almost over-the-top display. They certainly seemed to be playing.
The second magical happening was that not only did we have numerous dolphins this fine Saturday, but some whales also came to pay a visit. A small pod of what appeared to be pilot whales, breached several times over most of the time I was there. While catching photos of them breaching was not easy, I did get two shots of them as they were going back under the water.
Whales!
Kaï arrived somewhere around 3:30PM, and we had a lovely time swimming and playing in the sand and surf.
We went to Kehena two days in a row, and I snapped a few photos there each day.
This is the first batch.
Just before we left Kehena on Saturday, we took a few photos of ourselves.
After leaving Kehena, we walked to the Lawn, which is a large grassy area with trees in front of Seaview, where Kaï is now living, and a short walk from Kehena. Saturdays are generally pretty mellow at both Kehena and the Lawn, unlike Sunday, when they are hopping with people and activity.
These are a few shots of the Lawn, that I took before Kaï and I went back to her new place to make dinner.
These are some shots of the sunset taken from the Lawn. Please forgive the power lines.
As we were walking back to her place, we spotted these beautiful clouds with a lovely purple hue.
That night we made and shared a lovely, delicious, and very filling meal. The main dish had lentils, quinoa, squash from the garden, onions, garlic, sea salt, curry, cayanne, and perhaps a few spices more. We toasted, salted, and seasoned the squash seeds. To drink we had a tea of gotu kola, chamomile, mint, and mixed holy basils/Tulsi.
Here's a few photos of us and our meal just before sitting down to eat. We ate sitting on pillows.
The next morning, Sunday Funday, we went to ecstatic dance at Hawaiian Sanctuary. They had an actual Siberian shaman who spoke, drummed, chanted, sang, using animal sounds throughout. She drew a very large number of people. This was a very high energy dance. We danced, and sweated out cute little tushes off!
After dance, we went back to Kehena, to enjoy a short dip in the ocean, and to share some sweet conversation. Sunday at Kehena usually has a very good number of people, and a drum circle.
These are a few shots of Kehena before we left on Sunday.
As on Saturday, after the beach we went to the Lawn. The drum circle moves from Kehena to the Lawn around 4pm. Like Kehena, on Sunday the Lawn is packed, with the intoxicating sound of drums, as well as fire spinning, light arts, food vendors, and lots of people having a really good time with each other.
This last batch of photos are of and from the Lawn, as the sun set.
Kaï and I stayed at the Lawn until around 8PM, until my ride, one of the matriarch of the Lower Puna community, Yana, was ready to leave. This was the end of an inexpressibly sweet, fun, and exquisite weekend. My love and I said our good-byes (until next weekend), and we continued on to our respective destinations; her there in Seaview, and me several miles away deep in the jungle.
If you actually read all the way to the end of this post, thank you for sharing this precious time with me. 🙏💚