Sunday, February 5, 2023

Sunday, February 5, 2023

    During the night, I would awake and hear Koa throwing up several times with his dad in attendance. In the morning, I learned his last episode was at 2 am. It was only then that the boy fell asleep.

   Koa was fine for the rest of the day; no more throwing-up incidents, but he was sluggish and not up for eating much. Lauren offered me the same breakfast she had yesterday of fruit, yogurt, and granola. I was more than happy to accept it.

 While Lauren and Bobby attended to their two young children, I was at the kitchen island typing away, working on updates. I needed to catch up. When Lauren and Bobby gathered themselves, we all went to the hotel to spend time with Susan and Roy. We sat by the poolside with the ocean right there. 

    Bobby took Koa to play in the ocean and later to swim in the pool. Susan spent a good part of her time wheeling Rio's carriage around. I sat and talked with Roy for a while.

    Roy complained about a problem he had with one of his ankles. He twisted it. When the doctor examined it, he discovered it had suffered multiple injuries over the years. While the pain Roy initially suffered had subsided, it still bothered him and limited his activity level. I offered to do some healing. He didn't say no. He was reasonably cooperative for someone unfamiliar with this approach. I can appreciate the skepticism. I asked him about his pain level. It was a ten when he first injured it; it was now a four. I suggested he stop focusing on it. The best solution was to ignore it if he didn't harm it with activity.

   We went home to shower and dressed for dinner to celebrate Susan's seventy-third birthday and Roy and Susan's wedding anniversary. On the way there, Lauren asked how her father had responded to the healing. "He wasn't outright rude." Bobby and Lauren laughed. I thought Roy did pretty well. Mike couldn't have done better.

      Lauren and Bobby wanted to hire a babysitter for Koa because he had been sick the night before and could be challenging to control in a restaurant under the best circumstances. Their usual babysitter/nanny wasn't available. Her sister had been in a car accident, and she flew to the mainland to be with her.   

   Lauren found a babysitter online. Both Bobby and I were concerned. Stranger danger! How sad we have to think that way, but I grew up in a world where we got babysitters through people we knew. I called Judy, hoping she would know someone on Oahu, where she'd lived for thirty years. Lauren remained calm. She said she would check the person out when she arrived. If she didn't look okay, she would send her packing.   Hannah arrived, and she was wonderful. She got on the floor and engaged Koa.

   On the way to the restaurant, Bobby drove via a street filled with McMansions, thirty-million-dollar homes. Bobby's family home was in Kahala, but not in the wealthiest section. The high-end houses had a view of the water. They would be the first receivers of a tsunami.

  Roy and Susan had dinner reservations at the Orchid, a four-star restaurant in the Halekulani Hotel in Waikiki. It was Susan and Roy's favorite place to stay when they came to Hawaii. They were not staying there on this visit. They stayed in the hotel closest to where Lauren and her family lived. The restaurant layout was wonderful but not particularly unusual for Hawaii. I've seen better views of the ocean and sunset. We were a group of nine. Bobby's mom, one of his sisters, her husband, and their son were there. Rio slept peacefully in his stroller.

  The items on the menu were either unfamiliar or referenced: prawns, shrimp, or octopus, all seafood I'm allergic to. The only thing I was sure of on the menu was the steak. It was eh, but expensive. It wasn't very tasty; there were only two small potatoes. However, there were two delicious mushrooms. Sorry, I don't know what kind.

   After dinner, we all said goodbye and headed home. I wanted to change my flight. I realized the one I had was early enough to get me caught in Honolulu's rush hour traffic. It's bumper-to-bumper at five miles per hour. H-1 makes the Long Island Expressway, known as the longest parking lot in the world, look like a speedway.

   Bobby helped me change the flight online and offered to drive me in. Ali, his mother, also offered. She had to go to town for work after dropping Koa off at his preschool. She did that every morning on her way.  

  Back at home, Scott texted me that Adam had moved the two cement wedges for the gravesite from the driveway into the back of the car. From Scott's description, Adam was surprised by how heavy they were. Adam lifts two-hundred-pound propane gas containers at work, but these sounded like they might be heavier. I was concerned that he had injured himself. I texted him. He assured me he was okay.

  I got my ten thousand steps in today.