Brutal Side of Addiction

The magnetic pull and charming allure of Ohio that has held us in its orbit for almost four weeks has slipped and we've pointed our car west with the intention of fire-barreling our way across the mighty Mississippi river and into the states beyond.

We've happily bounced around the east coast, as far north as New Hampshire and as far east as Chicago - but Ohio, Tallmadge more specifically - has called us back each and every time. The superior hospitality of Kris' family, the quality of the cheesecake and wine, the ease and usability of the laundry facilities and the HD presentation of the NBA playoffs have turned this quaint home in northeastern Ohio into our road-trip-clubhouse. And while I'm certain we've shown our appreciation and gratitude, one more wouldn't hurt - Thanks Andy, Ann. Thank you Francesca, Casey, big Jimmy, lil Jimmy - - the whole clan - thank you once again.

This particular area of the United States (and the real truth of its magnetism) is Luigi's Pizza. Ask anyone whose been. They'll slap you right in the face for reminding them how long they've gone without a slice. They might whimper, it will be sad to watch. But the physical reaction of someone who appreciates this finest quality of pizza will look as it should, as though that person has glimpsed, one topping at a time, the centerpiece of what will be the great cloud-filled cafeteria of heaven. Those HAVE TO BE the only two locations, Akron and Heaven.

Sorry. But I've learned that description of food - exemplary examples of everyday eats - falls horribly short. And because this is a pizza joint (more or less) for me to tell you that their crust is painted by hand with the perfect blend of what must be pixy dust and butter doesn't do it. For me to say that the sauce to cheese and topping ratio is within a one-thousandth of absolute harmony doesn't help you to taste it. For me to wrap words around that red sauce, to attempt to say the word ZING without implying a roller coaster. . .

Hyperbole does it better.

It's good, I mean just way past good and into a different dictionary. I hope this shining endorsement inspires those who've spent their years without it to seek it out. Make a pilgrimage. Share this quiet little italian-memorabilia-filled eatery with the rest of the world. The staff has been there for decades, the kitchen is open until after two on the weekends. In the twelve odd nights we spent in Tallmadge, I'd say that ten were Luigi-infused and because of this I've taken on an extra six pounds in my "pizza region."

I'm sure that after the second slice, there was a meeting of the internal powers that be and the stomach laid forth plans for its first major expansion project since the M&M fueled 1984 season. From that point on, with the help of my salivary glands and a permanent image of pepperoni dancing like Rockettes through my frontal lobe, my body made a concerted effort to get more pizza, get more pizza until it became apparent that I needed help. Krissy intervened.

"I'm not sure we have enough," I said. I was holding the two pizzas in my lap.

"What?"

"I'm not sure we have enough, this isn't going to do it."

"We haven't even left the parking lot yet," she says and turns on the car.

"I know! It's the perfect time to get more of it. We're RIGHT HERE. We'll just have a slice while we wait, it's perfect. Would you like a slice now? I'm having a slice. Would you like a slice? I'm having a slice. No. No napkin. No."

I think she feared I'd eat the tips of my fingers clean off the way those little triangle-shaped morsels disappeared. I may have to jog a large portion of the 1300 miles to Colorado behind the car. Still not sure exactly where we're headed, but they won't have good pizza, I can now and forever more be certain of that.

Love's and A Trip Backward

Yes it occurs to me a section of travel fun has fallen off the map, out of this arena, out of the time-space-continuum itself.

It's not that serious, really. I just haven't gotten around to writing about it yet. I'll give it a throw now - -

A while ago, in a bar at the end of the street in Hoboken, New Jersey, we'd been enjoying cocktails with Chris Hayes and his NOW FIANCÉ Lauren (Congrats you two!). I'd compared drinking in one state and sleeping in another to playing Marco Polo in a Gulfstream.

You remember where we are?

The trip from Hoboken to Stamford took ninety minutes and falling sleep took ninety seconds. In the morning, when I removed the anvil of dried alcohol from atop my sleeping head, ahem... In the morning, after I'd eaten a handful of headache medicine and two bottles of water, we spent the day wandering Stamford and decided that just then, four or five days of highways after it should have dawned on us, we would go ahead and purchase a map. A map of roads with helpful information organized in a state-by-state layout. They sell them at Target. We bought ours there.

Lunch and wandering brought us to Greenwich Connecticut which could only be cuter or more quaint if they sold bunnies on the street corners. Bunnies with bundles of homemade cookies hanging from their necks, even. A filling dish of gnocchi at lunch and a persistent hangover requested a nap in the shade of a small tree raining pink petals into the freshly cut green grass. I obliged, and I drifted off in a scene that I can only describe as some of the middle bits of PLEASANTVILLE when all the characters start bucking conformity and their lives get, call it, colorful.

And then we decided to drive to Boston.

We spent a solid day wandering MIT and Harvard campuses, sneaking into the science building and wandering the halls of the English college. Then we splurged on a meal that could have fed several people, drank wine and martinis until well after midnight, and broke in a new plan of financing the experiences we want instead of merely "surviving" on bargain sandwich day at Subway as we scuttle across the country, frowning, our cold thrifty hands wrapped around the cast-iron fences that keep expensive fun in and medium-thrifty fun out.

We voted for financial ambivalence where it applied, is basically what we did.

And we decided to parlay that into Red Sox tickets for the next day, where we sat twenty-four rows behind home plate, yelled and cheered, ate hot dogs and drank beer until we were hoarse and freezing (it doesn't take much, the Maui skin is thin and doesn't like anything colder than sixty-two. The temperature in the ninth inning was forty-five with a breeze and I haven't owned a coat in who knows since when. Sandals were a poor choice.)

New Hampshire and our time there will remain a mystery for a moment longer. And following that will be the "Day of Four States" and the "To Hell With Block Island and You Too Mr. Parking Guy" rant. Don't want to miss those.

In closing: I love truck stops. Love's in particular, because they aren't the scary brand, they're the Loving Brand. Where else but a truck stop can you satisfy a shopping list that includes vintage-new cassette tapes of the Eagles, Casablanca on DVD, a fishing pole, a graphing calculator, a remote-controlled semi, hats from every college or nascar team on the circuit, Jack Daniels flavored beef jerky and 25cents worth of Obsession by Calvin Klein sprayed directly into the flannel expanse of your driving shirt. Where else can you get all that in one place and have a sweet woman with a GED and a vest help you with your purchases?

Oh right. Wal-mart...

Well. I love Truck Stops, Love's in particular. And we'll leave it at that.

Yiddish and Pictionary

Driving to a surprise party in Ohio currently. I will wait to post this until after the party has begun so as not to ruin the surprise. Listen to me worry about someone checking this blog site SO OFTEN that they would consult it prior to their dinner plans, before they fill up for gas or stop over at a winery for a glass of wine. I'll reel the ego back in and talk about ties instead.

I might be wearing a tie later today which would mark the fourth time in three years. This fact alone, I think, shows that ties and I will not keep regular company in my employment future. This rules out most office buildings and all of the Olive Gardens & California Pizza Kitchens. It's not that I feel uncomfortable in a tie - I feel quite good actually with a smartly-designed bit of silk or rayon hanging from my neck - its that they resemble little nooses. That and whenever I wear one I'm drowning in terror that I will dip it in mustard or get it caught in a combine of some sort - - thus ruining the only tie that I own and making it impossible for me to wear one every six months should the opportunity present itself. Maybe I won't wear one today as the surprise party might involve both mustard and farming equipment. It's Ohio, and anything could happen.

Krissy will hit me for that one, (and writing this too, come to think of it) so know that I am somewhere, tie-less, getting beat up. Aloha.

PS: after writing that – keep in mind that we're in the car and Kris is driving – I look up from the screen and she turns down her music from the thundering level it was to just something that borders on deafening and says to me: Are you writing mean things about me in there?

Our minds are linked to the point where she knows when I'm writing not-sweet things about her, but put us on the same Pictionary team and drawing something like ON or HARPOON or BULLSEYE and you'd think we were both blind and speaking different dialects of yiddish.

The Suite-est Thing

And before I forget - a word about networking.

Long have intelligent people known that it is, in fact, WHO you know that matters and not necessarily what you know. I know some stuff, it's good stuff. I know that Rudyard Kipling wrote the Jungle Book - but that doesn't get me a round of drinks in Maui, does it?

I know that Humphrey Bogart's last words were: "I should never have switched from Scotch to Martinis." But that doesn't get me free passage on the JFK Expressway outside Chicago, does it? Not even worth 80 cents, is it?

Hah.

However, I do know Josh Hogan. I was his best man at wedding number one, and I'm certain that I'm invited to wedding number two - and this time I'm insisting that HE is the best man. And I do know Jay Silber. Even though he and I have already discussed that I was in his "friend depth-chart" which didn't proffer me an invite to HIS nuptials, I would like to think that I've raised myself into a new level that would allow me access to, who knows, his retirement villa in southern France.

Now then, knowing Jay brought us to the northwestern suburbs of the Chicago area, brought us into a beautiful ranch-style home. Knowing Jay - and getting to know him better - made possible a big soft bed, a full evening of laughter and barbecued chicken, maps of Chicago, and two (count them, two) guide books to the ins-and-outs of Chicago - - books that were supposed to be sold at a recent garage sale but magically didn't sell.

Which reminds me, I owe Jay and Kate a dollar.

Knowing Josh Hogan is usually its own reward. His trials and tribulations from freshman year of college are enough to fill a database dedicated to the case studies of: The Effects of Alcohol and Poor Judgement on a Brand New Life Away From One's Parents. My favorite chapters include delivering phone books and hopping local trains shirtless and drunk in full view of several law enforcement officials. Knowing Josh now means something else. Before quitting his job at Marriott Josh put together a DHL package filled with signed Marriott Vouchers for half price rates. We've used these now in Connecticut, Boston and will be handing them in at several lesser known cities across the United States just as soon as we can get ourselves off the Eastern Half of the US.

Josh now works for Kimpton Hotels (www.kimptonhotels.com). They are everywhere and are awesome. . . in Chicago, the "friends and family" rate for the Hotel Allegro is around $100. That is already a fantastic discount from their regular fare - but something strange happens at check-in.

"Your SUITE isn't quite ready yet sir, but we'd be more than happy to hold on to your luggage while you go out and see the city for a few hours. Our concierge is at your disposal if you need to make any entertainment arrangements or dining reservations."

"Uh huh," I say. I was not expecting anyone to address me in this smooth-mannered tone as though I were dressed like this to avoid papparazzi, as though if my hat were lifted slightly from across my eyebrows someone somewhere in the lobby would rush me from my blind spot and need me to sigh his/her cleavage with a less than reliable ballpoint pen. It felt good. For one, I hadn't shaved in six days, was recovering from a cold and wearing a shirt covered in what I remember to be Mongolian Beef from P.F. Changs and a little bit of toothpaste.

Krissy and I walk away quietly and sit in the lobby, confused.

"Did he say suite? And do I have to go out and see Chicago dressed like this?" Krissy says to me in just above a whisper. We drive comfortably and we caffeinate regularly. This means baseball caps and no makeup, only marginally clean but definitely comfortable clothes, and Red Bull tremors in the eyes and fingertips.

"Josh must have done something, we didn't have a suite when I called this morning. We'll walk it off for a while, I guess."

We see the Bean, which for Chicagoans is a source of great polished pride. In real life, it is pretty incredible to see something that shiny, that big. The primitive kleptomaniac in me mumbles something like: "I want one of those for my own, my very own precious, my own seven-ton mirrored bean."

We drink cold beer and eat hot Chipotle - something that is missing from Maui but may be included once the enormous Barnes and Noble is constructed. Upon return to the Hotel Allegro, our suite on the 18^th floor is ready and is huge. I worry immediately that this suite will be bigger than the apartments we've come to research and in doing so will shadow any and all living opportunities with it's magnitude, comfort, and swanky-boutique-style decor. The suite comes complete with leopard and zebra patterned robes in which to lounge. . .

Thanks Josh.

I hadn't mentioned that we're fighting back colds with mechanically timed doses of Dayquil and Nyquil - a fact that will be important to understand when I describe in great detail how Krissy loses her equilibrium and nearly breaks her elbow, also achieving a faucet shaped bruise in the middle of her back. For now - back to the road.

Just Take Your Time - Easy Does It

The laundry is done and my toes are cold. It is off to Chicago tomorrow with plans of apartment searching and hot dog eating all the while continuing to remark that "summer" just isn't very warm "way out here" and that "summer" on "the island" is probably getting hotter than "balls" at this very "minute."

Also on the agenda in Chicago are real haircuts. It is no secret that I need one, and since living on the island has gotten me into the rhythm of shaving it all the way off every six months while straddling a trash can - - it might be nice to have someone professionally trained in these arts to sculpt it into something - anything - for my new "mainland" lifestyle.

A word: it's true, I can finally say it. The "mainland" needs to calm down. With the driving, and the complaining and the taking-it-all-way-too-seriously-thing that people seem to do. Just last week when driving in and around New Jersey we nearly died in flaming car carnage. People change lanes as though their tires will catch fire if they remain in one place too long - and at speeds not deemed safe or legal even by autobahn enthusiasts. I'm no Granny Goodwrench, I keep it at ten past the limit most of the time. But when someone squeezes past me at twenty mph faster, leaving all the clearance of a busy-city parallel parking endeavor. . . nope. I don't want that. Don't "need" that one.

Slow down, this IS the mainland.

Marco? Polo?

When the exciting part of this narrative left off, my ability to make reservations was in question and the general geography of Connecticut was a beautiful new dark landscape to be explored in both directions as we drove - effortlessly - up and down I-95 looking for a highway exit that both of us were certain, just plain dead-certain, didn’t exist.
It did.
So does Trumbull. They take hockey, both field and ice, very seriously in Trumbull, even more so in the Marriott we finally located. Hundreds of tie-or-skirt clad young people milled around the hotel bar with awards and bright red stadium blankets under their arms. I’ve seen people take a lot of different things to a bar before - laptops, children, ice cream cones, rollerblades - but never a blanket. They all had them, each with their names stitched in a corner: Tommy Perkins, Ice Hockey. Jenny Farnster, Field Hockey.
The morning took us back to Stamford where we commuted into NYC and wandered the Met in the morning and Central Park in the afternoon. New York during the first weeks of a late spring is utterly consumable. The breeze feels a crisp sixty-five or seventy and women are sprawled out on towels in their first new bikini of the year, legs and arms the color of the three clouds in the sky, sunglasses on, smiling and rummaging through bags from D’Agostino. It’s charming.
A "friend of the family", Chris Hayes from thus known only as Hayes, and I had been exchanging calls and text messages all morning and a loose plan of jumping the Hudson into Hoboken had taken shape. I’d not seen Hayes since flopping about on Lake Keuka with him several summers earlier. The line on him, from Brians True&Slavin is: You can’t oversell Hayes. They were as right that summer as they would be today if one of them emerged from the New Jersey PATH station and saw that smiling manchild waving a half-block away.
I realize that I’ve very loosely used the term "friend of the family" in the above description of Christopher Hayes. Here is how that works. My mother may never meet Hayes. This is unfortunate for both. When you are a little human, your "family" are the people that sit with you in the car on the way to church. They are the people who eat all your favorite cereal on purpose or tie you up around the knees and ankles with fishing line and throw you in the bushes when it’s snowing outside and you’re still wearing your polyester blue shorts and white polo-catholic-school shirt because you just got home from Great Books where your school friends and you, all twelve or thirteen years old, are forced to discuss the subtle nuances of character development in Little Women and Silas Marner or the anguish of isolationism in Robinson Crusoe. That’s your family when you’re little.
When you get to be a grown up (a shadowy term that never quite happens if your mother still worries about you ingesting yellow snow, you know, on accident) your FAMILY are the people who love and care about you, have different last names, eat all your favorite cereal on purpose, drink beer with you and (importantly) have met and/or are approved by one of your other family members. Until this time they are "friends of the family." Since Hayes is cousin-in-law to Brian True, a prominent member of my adult family, he could be compiled into an inventive third category - - but that’s not what we’re doing. This is a road trip not an inebriated genealogy symposium.
Ahem. Turns out - hah - that Hayes and his adorable counterpart Lauren are headed off to the Dominican Republic for a week and offer their tree-fort-style loft to us for that week. The exchange went a little something like this.
"Do you need another beer too?"
"Yes I do."
"Hey we’re going to the Dominican Republic for a week, you two should stay at our apartment. You want to do that?"
"Yes I do."
"Good."
"Good."
So we drank all night. Just after midnight when the bartender cleared away the mind-eraser glasses, it dawned on me. Hoboken is in New Jersey which is separated from New York City by a river and a state border. New York City is in New York and is separated from Stamford, Connecticut by another state line, the Bronx, on that particular night several angry Yankee fans, and a two-mile stretch of asphalt between the Stamford commuter train station and the hotel bed which I felt ready to enjoy if it and the city buildings would stop wobbling. Sobriety would be the fourth state in the mix. It was not on the map I had.
The joy of the East Coast, a joy that isn’t known by people west of, say, Tennessee, is that you do things in different states sometimes. Whole other states! Different Governors! Different license plates! Same oddly violent and hurried disposition, however.
For a long-haired former Maui resident that wasn’t used to leaving the two square miles of his tiny island town, getting home from a bar and walking around in three different states to do so feels a little like playing Marco Polo in a Gulfstream jet.
"Oh, Hayes."
"What’s up there Snapp?"
"We gotta go I think."
"Why? You want another shot, different bar? We can switch bars if you want."
"We have to sleep in Connecticut and this is New Jersey. I’m not used to that kind of thing."
And the next day when we awoke in Connecticut, we decided to drive to Massachusetts - - because that’s the kind of thing we are used to doing. Wake up one place, head out to some other place. We snagged the keys from Lauren, wished her well in D.R., took a quick nap in a Greenwich CT park under a pink flowering tree somewhere between Stepford and Old Greenwich... aloha for now, mahalo for reading.

The Socks Have Become Dirty

An update, and because it is Krissy's turn to drive, this will also serve as a promise for something of length and humor in the days to come. I sit, legs out and feet up, on Chris Hayes' couch in Hoboken, New Jersey. Chris and Lauren have gone to the Dominican Republic and have not yet seen how we've redecorated their house in their absence.

It is good.

By way of travel information, we have been out of work now for three weeks, traveling for eighteen days and I have been out of clean clothes (except underwear, Mom) for three. That said, we're headed back to base camp Ohio to re-calibrate our travel plans and wash our socks. Best wishes all around.

Hiatus

Days - days - have gone by and adventures abound. We found Trumbull (a charming little enclave of Connecticut) and then a week went by. At one point we woke up in New Hampshire, ate lunch in Rhode Island - almost moved to Block Island - ate dinner in Connecticut and went to sleep in New Jersey.
It’s a whirlwind - and this points easily to why the updates on this particular blog have fallen drastically short of regular.
They will resume soon, I promise.

Not Trumboldt, Trumbull. . .

The actual road portion of the road trip began today as we embarked from Tallmadge, Ohio and pointed the car towards New York City. The road is straight sometimes, curvy in others. Sometimes there are cones and construction men on the road, sometimes not. The trees are leafy or not leafy - mostly not leafy. Each mile marker has a bigger number on it than the one previous to it. Trucks!
I had forgotten what the driving part of a road trip actually entails. It’s sitting and listening, changing your position and applying chapstick seemingly non-stop. The wind blows your hair, you drink a red bull or two, and when not passing the miles and miles of cow pastures one can inhale deeply and feel the very molecules of the open road spiraling deep into the lungs, fortifying the adventure until exhaled. And then you change positions in your seat and listen to the radio some more.
This is all easily explainable in that I’ve spent more time in a car today than I have in the last year. After 20 minutes I get confused that I’m not already at my destination. Where is the ocean? How come the radio deejay isn’t speaking with a slight pidgin tone to his voice? Where are all these other people going and where, my good sweet Jesus, where have all the Sebring Convertibles gone? The polished Mustangs with sunburnt snorkelers?
When living on Maui a person without a car will only be inside of one to retrieve someone from the airport or buy new socks from Kmart - neither are more than 30 minutes away. Other than that, it’s a bicycle kind of world. Groceries are limited to the weight bearable in a Schwinn basket and backpack.
But today New York is our new destination, and like the flowers on the trees in Central Park, people are out and about. Hotels are booked beyond booked and priced beyond pricey. The Homeless are charging $39 a night for their refrigerator boxes, the Ritz Carlton doesn’t valet your car, they keep it as a down payment on a three-night stay. So Connecticut is going to be our backdoor to the $15 martinis we so richly desire.
Luckily I was in charge of making the reservations for a hotel in Connecticut. I fulfilled this task by not doing anything and assuring my beautiful and forgiving travel partner that I had in fact already made the reservations. Sitting 16 inches apart for six hours doesn’t allow one a whole lot of "alone time" to cover one’s ass and make new hotel reservations exactly like the ones that were supposed to have been made already.
"Why would you tell me that you already made them if you didn’t make them?"
"I’m not exactly sure why I would do that."
"Well where are we going to sleep tonight, do you know that?"
"I’m not exactly sure about that either. I’ll probably know very soon though."
"Are you going to start looking now or should I pull over and do it?"
"This is my fault. I will fix this. I will call the hotels. I’ve got this all under control."
"I’ve heard that before," she says.
And then cell phone coverage got, we’ll call it, spotty. I did get to meet Pearl, Murray, Eve and Joy at 1-800-Marriott in acquiring one nights stay at some hotel in some city somewhere in Connecticut. At one point I did accidentally repeat Pearl when she said a sentence ending with: 19 miles north of Stamford.
"North of Stamford? Are we still going to New York?" the calmest, most non-violent girl I’ve ever known says as she continues to drive. So funny, she is! Doesn’t trust me with these things she doesn’t! Hah!
"Shh, honey please," I whisper at her. "I’m talking to Pearl on the telephone. Pearl is doing her best, and her best is damn fine I’m sure."
And then Pearl went the same quick and quiet way that Murray and Eve had gone, lost to the world of cellular technology and some roadside static as the state lines passed beneath our car like any other bit of pavement. Does anyone know where Trumboldt Connecticut is?
It should also be known that our timeline for departure and travel on this the first day of our two months on the road together was also something I had a hand in planning. And this is why I have enough time to comfortably sit in traffic and write funny things about our trip as though I’d known we’d hit gridlock at the same exact moment inspiration for travel writing would. I’m practically on par with Magellan at this point.

A Serious Pause

On a very serious note, (and a likely departure from the light frivolity of usual content) I’ll say that before I left Hawaii I had loose ends to tie together. Leaving a place you’ve lived does that, it unties things. One of these things that was untied was my family. In August we lost my father to a heart attack. He and I were swimming in the ocean when it happened, and the ties that bind - well, they broke.
And like anything that is put back together with a piece missing, the family resurrected itself tighter, more compact, stronger for our new knots. But a detail that sat with me was the fact that Hawaii was the place that claimed him. Hawaii and the ocean - the open water - that was how he left us, and how he would have likely wanted to leave. The notion that this was all cosmically on purpose was not lost on me, and in doing a touch of research into Polynesian culture and history I learned and adapted the following:
Hundreds of years ago, Hawaiian elders believed that allowing the ocean to consume them was a way to perpetuate their spirit’s journey. They believed that by giving their life and spirit to a manö (pronounced mah-noo), or shark, was to become that shark and to live in the open water and protect generations to follow. Elders, after celebrating their life through luau, dance and song, would often throw themselves from the cliffs into the ocean for the sharks. It is typical to see the Polynesian representation of manö tattooed on the shoulders and chests of Hawaiian men. In that same vein, petroglyphic turtles, honu, represent Kauila the mythical mother of all turtles and are seen tattooed on Hawaiian women. Some have both, some have neither - you get the idea.
On that day in August there on the beach, I cut my feet quite badly along the coral. One such section has left a raised, half-inch scar on the top of my foot, a permanent reminder of that exact day. But I wanted more than a reminder - I wanted it to become a memorial - an effigy - a tribute - a sign and symbol of love and faith and strength and manhood. So when I went into the Polynesian tattoo parlor on that Monday before I left Maui, I explained slowly what I needed and more importantly what I needed it to mean and why.
It is beautiful and complicated; it is as it should be.
The leaves in the tail of the manö represent Lauhala leaves and stand for loyalty. The weaving designs through the tail come together like a basket, tied to make one thing whole and to keep something inside it. The weavings represent family. Both the tribal "shark’s teeth" on the left fin and the Samoan spear heads that travel along the manö’s back represent strength, courage. The design in the top fin, a sun-like piece, touches on rebirth and on the legend of Maui itself. The rest of the designs are modified and manipulated from the traditional Aoeteran tribal art of the Maori peoples in New Zealand.
This manö, for me, represents my father leaving this world and becoming part of the open water. It represents his spirit, his love, and his constant protection of me and my family. I believe that on that day he left his body long before any of us knew it - he put himself over the cliffs and into the water so he could become our guardian. And as sharks are likely to do, he took a piece of my foot with him. I’ll have a scar to remember where my blood has been spilt, and the manö to remember who made me strong enough walk from the ocean that day. Every day.
So if you see it and wonder, that is the whole story behind my latest tattoo. It isn’t a plumeria bloom to mark my time on the island. It isn’t the islands themselves in some kitsch way to take Hawaii with me. It is a way for me to pay tribute to my ancestors, to pay respect to my father’s quiet love of the islands, and take strength from the fact that all of those things - like the ink in which they are represented - are permanent.

Just Who is this Sukey Person?

What time is it, really? I feel like the biggest whining pile of sleepy drivel every time someone else says anything along the lines of: "Wake up, it’s five-thirty at night" or "Please don’t nap behind the wheel" or "We’ve got company, try not to drool on the tablecloth. It’s new."
But I’m having issues with the jet lag. I am. This morning as I lay awake at 5:20 am, doing all the things that desperately awake people do - squinting my eyes shut, humming Louis Armstrong and Paul Anka, counting the number of minutes of sleep I could get before the rest of the house awakes and wants me to eat frittata - and I began planning what I will refer to forever more as: My Goal Structure.
The goal structure goes like this. In six months I’d like to be horribly successful and wealthy, and then backtracking through several totally unrealistic steps by which to attain above-mentioned success and wealth. If tomorrow, after frittata, I place several well-worded emails to former professors asking for letters of recommendation to audit writing programs at several illustrious universities in so doing opening long-closed lines of communication to the literary world and thus setting the first domino in motion.
Instead, I’ve got this: "Put your head on my shoulder. . .hold me in your arms, baby, squeeze me oh so tight. . ."
If tomorrow, after frittata, I begin revising my writing resume and updating the table of contents that shows my completed (few) versus my incompleted (many) manuscripts in so doing giving myself an accurate snapshot of the body of work which I possess and hopefully enabling me to forecast any/all possible works of usable fiction to continue my career or sell blindly to faceless executives for large amounts of cash.
"Oh the shark has, pretty teeth dear . . . and he shows them, pearly white. Just a jackknife, has macheath yeah, and he keeps it, out of sight . . ." I can hum the lyrics right up to the part about Sukey Tawdry and Jenny Diver and then all rational thought is lost with the thought of someone out there in the world, a past world maybe, named Sukey.
And then it was six o’clock.
I should be out there with my laptop, writing something. I could be in the kitchen, helping with the frittata. I could be. . .
And I fell asleep.
I dreamt of my goal structure. I dreamt of being a race car driver. I dreamt of a huge soft bed with soft white light muted by curtains and breezes through white-paneled windows. And then boom - nine thirty - time to wake up - time to enjoy frittata - time to put enough caffeine into a human body to heat Stalingrad in the wintertime or to make usable comparisons and metaphors. . .ahem.
Yes, I am having problems with the jet lag.

Carve This Plastic Table Please

The time change continues to confuse even the most experienced napping schedule. At the time of this writing, 6:15pm, I am ready for my mid-morning nap instead of my mid-evening nap. For this reason, I am hungry for lunch despite the fact that it is almost dinner time. Furthermore, having quit my job and beginning to realize that I will be out of work for six straight weeks, my mind still kicks out three minutes of negative thought knowing that after my mid-afternoon nap I will have to wake up, shave my face and go to work.

So I sit here and don't know whether I'm supposed to be hungry, tired, happy that I don't have to work today or sad that I'm not taking a nap.

Instead of this continued worry, a note about Amish. While eating in a little local bar and grille (I like the added e on grille, it makes me feel like there will be extra fries involved for some reason) we watched a parade of Amish women carrying different products from a second-hand store to an open truck. The truck was not attached to a horse, as I thought it was supposed to be, nor was the PlaySkool mini-table hand-carved or made from local poplars by hand.

I'm not an idiot. I'm not naive. It's 2007. This is a 21^st century Amish, a different brand of purists, perhaps. A separate-by-desire kind of lifestyle is what they're looking for, and sometimes sure one of them needs a taxi cab or a refrigerator that runs on kerosene from a company somewhere that makes refrigerators that run on kerosene - - but I thought these once-in-a-while societal dependencies wouldn't be breached for something like a plastic table.

Right?

Life continued on and brought me, by way of adorable local tour guide and her father, to the high school of Akron/Tallmadge's favorite son: LeBron James. And honestly, when I saw the school from the window of the mini-van we were riding in, I can say that it DID look like someplace where a now-famous basketball player might attend school. I didn't see any basketball courts on the premises; a thought that only seems ironic now.

I leave you with that as it is either nap time or eating time and I don't want to be late for either.

The Fondest Aloha

The time has come to bid a fond Aloha to the sandwich isles of Hawaii.

Aloooha.

I moved here with a backpack and a computer and am leaving with ten wine boxes filled with god knows what, a duffel bag the size of a modern-day couch and a travel golf bag that could comfortably fit a person of my exact size and stature. But that all will fit into a rental car and an airplane so that's still what I plan to do – fly, fly away.

Yeah I'm ready. It was sitting at Ruth's Chris recently when someone got it right: We're too young to be semi-retired. Yes. Retirement comes with two shades, the first is that you have the money you need and the second is that you are now going to live someplace sunny until you die. That second part, by modern medicine standards, means I'll eat at that same Ruth Chris for sixty more years. No. it's time to get out for a while and I will not say out loud that I'll never return – I may. Lots of people do. It won't be soon, but I may return.

Also, in the vein of updates and things, I have added a Polynesian manu (or shark) to the top of my left foot. I will include pictures of this newest tattoo when it ceases to be gross looking and starts to be good-looking. It has a story behind it that is long and vivid and that doesn't appear here quite yet. Perhaps in some fiction somewhere.

To all the kids on and around Front Street, don't be a stranger. Come over anytime you want. Come visit when you need a highway with more than one lane or a little bit of cold weather. (Chicago!) And don't forget that through the miracles of the world wide web, we'll likely get closer now that we're farther away.

And finally, something I never knew I'd be saying:

I'm going to Ohio. I'll talk to you later.