Hawai՛i: Finding True Love

Photo by Luke McKeown on Unsplash

Prelude

The Tradewinds coming in from the northeast are strong in Hawai’i. We are warned not to have the front door and the door to the lanai open at the same time, because the wind is so strong. While Pat is bringing in the luggage, the front door doesn’t latch properly, and it blows open. The wind begins to whistle past my head. The blinds rattle. Papers on the coffee table take to the air. I race to shut the front door before the pictures on the wall fall and I can no longer stand. Whew! The wind isn’t just strong, it is fierce.

Pat and I are on a much-needed vacation to Hawai’i. With three children to raise, my difficult mother living with us, her illness and death, and two demanding careers, we could only deal with the practical stuff, the day-to-day tasks. The strong winds of modern life we dealt with every day, but gale force winds nearly swept us away when crises repeatedly challenged us. The final challenge of retirement and my diagnosis of heart failure arrived. We need to reconnect, to find less windy waters. This trip to a condo nine floors up and overlooking the ocean ought to help us at least start.

Our condo is comfortable and well-appointed with a living room, decent kitchen, and one bedroom. The decorations reflect a Hawai’ian sensibility. No tiki hut decor–instead a beautiful picture of Liliu’okalani, the last queen of the Kingdom of Hawai’i. Pictures of Hawai’ian flowers on the living room wall are enhanced by a large canoe paddle angled beside them. A curved woven basket with a large conche shell rest on the TV table.

Sliding glass doors display a spectacular view of the Pacific Ocean, facing west. The water is aqua in color in the shallows, shading gradually to cobalt blue where the ocean floor drops away. We are in a small cove embraced by rocky hills. The wild sound of the surf thundering against the shore stirs something infinite in my soul, and joy rises within me. I have wanted this for a long time.

We unpack and then sit in the chairs on the lanai to watch the sunset. To our surprise, three men emerge onto the beach below to blow conche shells, one after the other and then together in harmony just as the sun drops below the horizon. The sound of the conche shells is deep and warm, part of a fitting farewell to the sun.

The morning after our arrival we go for groceries. Hawai՛i has some colorful birds, some of them native to Hawai’i. I don’t see any of those colorful birds here, perhaps not surprisingly, as they live in the forests. I do see some sparrows and a crow as we walk across the parking lot, and a feral cat.

The west coast of Hawai’i, where we are, has a mountain range running parallel to the coast. The mountains are sharp, as if newborn, and partially covered in some sort of shrub. The rocks are volcanic in origin, a deep reddish brown, and volcanic tuff lies at the base of the nearly vertical cliffs.

I see a tree with polished white trunks and branches but no leaves or needles anywhere. They look long dead and weathered for years, but at the end of some branches, yellow flowers have opened, proclaiming the triumph of life. Other trees are just beginning to flower with delicate red or purple blossoms. I hope this trip will reawaken feelings for us.

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Movement 1: The Cruise

Tonight we have a sunset cruise on the west side of Oahu. There are three couples signed up for the cruise – one middle-aged couple who look fit, and Pat and me, who are old, white-haired, and fat. The third couple are young, maybe in their twenties.

The cruise is lovely and intimate, just the six of us and two crew, on a sleek white catamaran. The food is Hawai’ian hors d'oeuvres, with as much champagne as we want. Under sail, the boat rides the waves like a seagull rides the air. The weather is fair, with just enough wind to fill the sails.

The young and middle-aged couples move off to the ship’s bow, where there are comfortable beanbag seats. Pat and I remain behind, mostly because I don’t feel comfortable clambering along the side of the gently rocking boat with only a railing between me and the Pacific Ocean. The water is cobalt blue, a sign of its depth. We sit and watch the wake, barely a ripple, reveal we are moving fast. Finally I accept the crew’s offer of help and I venture the trip to the bow. Pat and I both make it without falling overboard, and we settle onto the deck and now watch the waves sweep by. We are under sail now, and the boat skims the waves effortlessly. The only sound is the slapping of the waves against her hull.

The young woman asks her significant other to get her a drink. He departs, and she pulls out her cellphone and starts filming herself, turning this way and that and making kissy faces. I can’t believe such a thing could happen, that someone could be so enamored with themselves to do something like that in public, but there she is in plain sight. She is totally entranced by her own beauty, and there is no doubt, she is a beauty.

Her partner/date returns with her drink and sits down beside her. She hands him the camera and he films her too. I feel sorry for them both. What will she have when she is 50? How long will he be able to stand it? And why am I so judgmental?

The sunset is advancing rapidly. Pat says to the crew, in encyclopedic form, “Sometimes there is a green flash just as the sun sets below the horizon. It emanates from the sun’s last rays, only under special atmospheric conditions.”

The crew seems interested, and they turn toward the sunset.

Just as the sun sets, we do indeed see a green flash. Everyone is excited. It is not on a par with a solar eclipse, but it is cool. We saw this once before on the Oregon coast, just after our engagement.  This was/is a special event for us, then and now, like a seal of approval. Pat turns to me for a kiss. I feel relaxed and warm, and it is not entirely the champagne.

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Movement 2: Valentine’s Day

The next day is Valentine’s Day. Pat and I have not had a good photographer take our picture as a couple since our wedding, and this is the perfect opportunity. I book a full-fledged photo shoot specifically on this day to capture the romance and golden glow of our shared lifetime.

The shoot is on a northern beach near the northwest corner of Oahu. This location is hard to access. As advertised, the beach is empty and wild. The trade winds drive the surf to this side of the island; this is where romance has blown us.

Today the sky is threatening rain. We are joined by our photographer Anna, a young woman of Scandinavian background. I wear a long blue dress with tiny white flowers, further covered by a white caftan that unbuttons in the front. In other words, I am prepared to be covered, yet windblown. Pat dresses in blue jeans and his signature teal-blue polo shirt.

As we move toward the beach, I see something brown skittering ahead of us across the path, long-bodied and short-legged with a furry tail.  Anna says it is a mongoose. She tells us the mongooses were brought in to control the rat population that had arrived with the European ships. Unfortunately, the solution was nearly as bad as the problem. Both rats and mongooses wreak devastation on the native birds and plants. Rats like to eat the hearts of palm trees, which kills the trees, so Hawai’ians now wreathe each palm with a sheath of metal or sometimes a spiral of lights to keep the rats from climbing. Rats and mongooses also eat the bird eggs of native species, many of which nest on the ground.

Anna points out the spouts of humpback whales on the far horizon. Their population has rebounded in recent years, and they can be found off Hawai’ian waters in the winter. I also see in the distance a monk seal alone on the beach, probably a pup that is now old enough to stay by itself while the mother feeds. These seals are endangered. Signs and placards warn not to approach them. Anna tells us that the monk seal population has declined to about a third of what it once was. They like secluded beaches where they won’t be bothered, which are rare on Oahu.

I can’t help noticing these things. I am a biologist. Everywhere I go on this island, there is evidence of human-caused ecological damage. For example, changes to the water cycle on Oahu and Maui: everywhere it is paved over or developed, water runs from the mountains into the paved-over valleys, causing flooding from the runoff, but as a result the water does not soak into the soil. This problem may have contributed to the catastrophic fires in Lahaina, Maui this year. An invasive species of grass had dried due to the lack of water. Also contributing were high winds the island was experiencing at the time. The grass and wind fueled the fire and drove it rapidly toward the city.

Native species are being pushed out by invasive species. I saw crows and sparrows the first day here, birds that are adapted to life with humans. Hawaii’s endemic birds, found only on these islands, are forest birds. Three of these birds are quite beautiful: the ‘i’iwi bird, with scarlet plumage, black wings, and long curved pink beak; the ‘akiapola’au with yellow chest, orange head, black face, white tail and belly, and gray wings; and the ‘akepa, where the males are bright red-orange, and the females have a greenish upper body and yellow belly. These birds are endangered due to loss of habitat, the introduction of predators, and invasive plant species. There are only 26 forest bird species still in existence today, and 24 of those species are listed by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature as vulnerable, near-threatened, threatened, endangered, or critically endangered, including the three I have described.

I remind myself that nothing ever stays the same, that ecosystems adjust. People have been pushing out other people and changing ecosystems for as long as we have records. But now with better information, we can reduce those losses, if we have the will. Sadly, it is likely that some species will still disappear forever.

Anna takes photos of Pat and me in that wild landscape, at what would be sunset if we could see the sun. We move together through grasslands with the mountains as a backdrop. We dance, we kiss. We get windblown. Pat and I reenact the iconic scene from Titanic. We hold each other like smitten high school lovers, and it is not just for the camera. I find joy today in Pat’s arms.

Then it begins to rain. We scoff. As Northwestern natives, we say, “A little rain won’t hurt us.” Then the sprinkling turns into a genuine deluge. We laugh and I try to lead Pat in a dance, but we are getting soaked and the sand is too deep for dancing. We clamber through the sand up to the car, still laughing.

[Pat: I don’t think I have a dry stitch of clothing on me by the time we reach the car.] 

In the tropics, the sun sinks below the horizon rapidly, and dusk is short. Within minutes it is dark. We have about an hour-long drive to a remote surfing town known for its restaurants, but since it’s Valentine’s Day, the tables are taken by the time we get there. There is an hour-and-a-half wait at the one Anna recommended. We sit in the dark in our car, still soaked from the storm but warmed by the heated seats. We reminisce about the early days of our relationship.

Pat remembers a time an Italian lab mate came to dinner. I barely remember but as Pat talks it comes back to me. The lab mate gave us tips about getting gas coupons in Italy, and about when wild boar is in season. Pat really likes wild boar and had it on our honeymoon. Hence the unusual conversation. What I remember about the lab-mate’s visit is daring to fix gnocchi for an Italian!

We talk about the time we prepared a French dinner for guests who had purchased tickets for the meal in a school auction. It is an audacious thing to promise.

Thus, we have an obligation for our cooking to shine. We cook it in the tiny kitchen of our first apartment. Pat remembers the wines we served, and I remember the dishes I cooked. The menu is Chablis with oysters; coq au vin with a Cote de Beaune Burgundy from Albert Morot, and poached pears with a dessert wine. There probably are vegetables as well, but I don’t remember. We go out and purchase a dining table and tablecloth and napkins for the occasion. As newlyweds, we don’t have them yet. Of course, there are flowers too. The whole thing is stressful, but great fun.

[Pat: Ann did a spectacular coq au vin, and the pears were perfect. I remember the red wine because I had visited the producer on a trip to France, and years later saw it for sale in a Seattle grocery store. I don’t remember the producer for the Chablis or anything about the half-bottle of dessert wine we had with the pears.]

We talk about our move to Boston so I can be a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard, and how Pat followed me to Boston. He had to get a new job. This was a major sacrifice on his part, so he won my heart again and got brownie points from all my female friends.

Light and steady winds from the northeast.

Blazing torches light the warm Hawai’ian night, and the heated seats in our rental car dry our clothes somewhat, but I am still cold. When they call us in, I ask for a hot toddy, and they don’t know what that is. I ask for black tea with rum, and it arrives lukewarm. Oh well. I guess the idea of hot drinks is foreign to Hawai՛i. Pat and I enjoy a wonderful meal of stuffed pork loin, potatoes, and braised vegetables, and I have chocolate cake with vanilla ice cream.

In our dating days, Pat and I would often linger over dinner, talking while the wait staff stood, waiting for us to be done. We do that this evening too. We have so much to talk about! I like brainy discussions about history, philosophy, theology, and biology. Pat likes history, philosophy, theology, food and wine, and fantasy and science fiction. I can keep up with fantasy and science fiction, and I throw in music and poetry.

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Movement 3: Reality Strikes

During the early days of our marriage, I discover those subjects aren’t enough for me. What’s missing is that he doesn’t talk about his feelings. I think it is because I just don’t stir up his feelings. He told me before we got engaged that he had expected to experience love at first sight, but he didn’t with me. I suffer from chronic feelings of not being enough, so I swallow it.

The fact that he doesn’t talk about his feelings produces a major strain in our marriage. Above all I desire intimacy: a close relationship where we can share our inmost feelings, where we are in tune with each other, where I feel that he understands me.

This is something he doesn’t do. His conversations are limited to "non-fiction" topics or intellectual discussions, with no mention of feelings or emotional content in our relationship.

The thing that tipped me toward thinking he might be on the autistic spectrum is an event in 2013. During an extreme family crisis nine years ago (2013), after 24 years of marriage (!) it finally hits me. He has not shown any feelings or support for me during the crisis. This isn’t normal.

[Pat: Ann is at the hospital with one child and I am at home with the other two children. I don’t know how bad it is until much later. I can’t read Ann’s face to see the stress she is under.]

I ask him, “Can you tell how I am feeling by looking at my face?”

“No,” he says.

A metaphorical emotional storm sweeps in, with sharp gusts and driving rain. This revelation causes me to gasp, to stagger mentally.  Suddenly many of our struggles to communicate over the last 24 years are explained. Pat is on the autism spectrum, probably with what used to be called Asperger’s. He cannot read faces. He can’t read social cues. He can’t express emotion. All those evenings with me begging him to tell me what he was feeling accomplished nothing, except to hurt Pat. Demanding that he explain his feelings, or why he doesn’t notice I am depressed, just confuses him. He CAN’T do those things. Instead, he takes it as criticism, as my disappointment in him, and not as my bewilderment at what seems to be bizarre. I know he has feelings. What I don’t understand until now is why he can’t express them.

I am suddenly enraged. The emotion surges into me like a tidal bore pouring up a river. What the *uc*! How did this happen? How did I let myself find the love of my life and have him be constitutionally unable to meet my needs for close personal intimacy?! I feel trapped. I feel devastated. And boy, am I angry. ANGRY because I hurt. I tell myself it is over. I will never have the intimacy I seek with my husband. No matter how I try, I cannot make Pat into something he is not.

For the next two years, I am angry. I avoid conversations with Pat. I am hot, and then I turn icy cold. Robert Frost said that ice would suffice to end the world. I agree. The freeze I give Pat is terrible and uncalled for, but I am in the grip of despair, hurt, and anger, and I have nothing to give.

The ironic thing is, I don’t know if he noticed how I was feeling!

Gradually I begin to thaw. It takes years, but I finally reach a place of acceptance. Pat is who he is, and nothing will change that. I decide to love Pat for who he is, and not focus on who he is not.

I still wish I could have some of those romantic moments I see on TV. He might put his hand on my shoulder as he passes me in the kitchen, kiss the nape of my neck, and say “You look lovely tonight.”

Nope. Every night he says, "Good night, my love.” That is lovely, but I want more.

So how do I end up in a marriage like this? I have a blind spot of my own, apparently. I wanted to get married, and Pat was the one who showed up. I didn’t see the warning signs. Let me show you how it happened.

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Intermezzo: The Marriage Memorandum

When I am 19, I tell God what I would like in a husband. I shoot him a prayer request that might as well be a memorandum spelling out the actionable items. He should be taller than me, have dark hair, be intelligent, have integrity, share my faith, and not be intimidated by my intelligence. I then graciously add a final clause to my audacious prayer, “And please, work on my faults while I am waiting so that I will be ready for him.”

God hears me. Too bad I don’t add a timetable.

Years pass. I finish college and explore things. I am now in California and feeling depressed because I still have no boyfriend and no prospects. I realize I am now 26. I say, “Why is this taking so long? It has been 7 years!”

I distinctly hear “And it will be another 7 years.”

What?! I am not happy to put it mildly!

Time passes. My father is diagnosed with cancer. I return from a trip to visit him, and I am crying. Graduate school is a struggle, I have no friends, aaaaaand… suddenly I remember my prayer, which of course I have forgotten until now. How long has it been? I was 26 years old. Now I am 33. It has been 7 years!

I say, "All right God. Time’s up. It has been 7 years since the last time and if you don’t do something RIGHT NOW I will become a nun!”

Two or three seconds later the phone rings, and on the other end is Pat. We have met once at a social sponsored by a singles group. We don’t know each other. He is calling to see if I want to go on a ski trip with the singles group. He has no idea what he has triggered. We talk for hours. This is December 1986.

We go on our first date that weekend. (I don’t tell Pat about the 14-year thing. That would scare any man away.) He fits all my criteria to a T. He is Catholic. I am a Catholic now–I converted three years ago. This is the reason we meet in the first place. It is a Catholic singles group. God has taken me up on my final clause in the “My future husband” memorandum of 14 years ago and prepared me. But I do not jump to conclusions. He must check out in general–he must be of sound mind, good character, good family, and good teeth. Well, maybe two out of four. But most essentially–I need to love him, and he needs to love me.

We date for two years. Most of our dates involve food. I gain twenty pounds. We have so much in common, I think, and we never cease to have things to talk about. There is strong physical attraction also. But I keep having to push Pat into the next step. I ask to meet his parents after we have been dating for one and a half years. It had not occurred to him as something that should be done.

The Marriage Question

For the last several months we have struggled with the Question. Do we want to get married? I have known for a while I want Pat. On the other hand, Pat is slow to commit.

He is going on a three-week trip to Germany. He tells me before he leaves that he will make a decision while he is gone.

While Pat is away, my father dies. I fly down to help my mother with arrangements. Pat returns on September 9th and I am in Florida. What was to be three weeks waiting for his decision, is stretched to five when my mother gets sick with an illness brought on by my father’s death. I remain with her until she is better. I then need to drive my father’s car, which he left to me, up to Washington D.C. for his interment.  I have not been able to see Pat for five weeks, and he won’t tell me his decision over the phone.

I meet Pat at Washington National Airport. He doesn’t say anything about his decision. This is highly unfair! I am deep in grief and this on top of everything else is driving me crazy. He said he wanted to tell me in person. Well, here I am, and nothing! Nada! Nichts! I don’t need whatever game Pat is playing. But he agrees to drive the car across the country with me, which will keep us in contact, and allow him to think at the same time. I also plot what I will do if he ever does propose.

[Pat: I don’t want to interfere with the family’s time of grief, either in time or in space, with a marriage proposal. The family needs to focus of the loss of Ann’s father and each other. So I wait. I don’t tell Ann my reasoning because that would have given away the game.]

My father is interred at Arlington National Cemetery with full military honors. It is a beautiful ceremony. The next day, we begin our trip.

Pat tells me one of his old girlfriends came to see him while I was gone. I am now even angrier. What? This is absurd. I am not chopped meat in saran wrap to be compared to another package! Why do I let him treat me this way?

[Pat: I didn’t tell Ann about the girlfriend's visit until later. I don’t do social communication very well, but even I can tell that mentioning that, then, would not work. I did tell her later. As you can see, it didn’t work out then either.]   

We travel through Tennessee to Little Rock, Arkansas. From Arkansas, we drive west to Albuquerque, New Mexico. The Mexican food is amazing, but I am still brooding over my many wrongs. Is he going to make me wait all the way to Seattle before he tells me what he has decided? I feel like a fool for not telling him to get lost. But I don’t want to do that.

Next is the Grand Canyon. I have always wanted to see it, so Pat has incorporated a stop into our plans. The driving goes on for hours. Pat asks me questions about how many kids I want, and we talk a little about our Myers-Briggs personality results. I am INTJ, which describes my major personality traits (introverted, intuitive, thinking, judging) and so is Pat. Imagine that!

We turn north at Flagstaff, Arizona, and get lunch in Tuba City. Pat has made arrangements to stay on the north rim of the Grand Canyon, which he knows is gorgeous. We don’t talk much after lunch. I suspect something is in the works. Pat drives like a man on a mission, totally focused, almost grim. We approach the canyon just as the sun is beginning to set. He sweeps me out to Bright Angel Point, which proves to be occupied by campers talking about how they had to pack their poop out of the canyon.

Pat says, “Let’s go somewhere else.” We walk back up Bright Angel Canyon, find a bench, and sit down. I goggle at the amazing beauty. It is nearly sunset. The view sweeps everything else out of my mind.

Then I hear Pat say, “Ann?”

“Yes,” I reply, still staring at the canyon in awe.

“Will you marry me?”

I am so surprised I say, “Yes!” without thinking. As he likes to say, he has achieved tactical surprise. It is VERY romantic.

[Pat: This was the pinnacle of a very eventful week, for both of us. I couldn’t imagine proposing anywhere close to the funeral, in time or place. That would have been putting my desires ahead of the needs of Ann’s family. I already knew that Ann had inherited a car, so I/we would not need to rent one. So I made reservations at the North Rim, called my friends in Little Rock, and left the other items TBD.  But I needed to arrive before sunset at the north rim of the Grand Canyon, and I wasn’t sure about the drive times. I had been there several years before and knew where to go, etc. It is the most spectacular place I have seen on Earth. I thought I was going to be too late. When we parked, Ann mistook a side canyon for the main one. I wanted us to be at Bright Angel Point for my proposal, but that detail did not work out. We got engaged, which was the whole point…… But the delay in my asking was hard on Ann. My backup, if it came to her calling me out, was to say that I was going to propose to her, but not now. I hoped that she had figured it out since we’re talking about the Grand Canyon here. But she didn’t, and the rest is our life together.]

So that’s how it happens. We are married on July 1, 1989, and begin our adventure together. Fast forward thirty-three years to Hawaii.

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Movement 3: So What Seems to be the Trouble?

The weather continues to be wet over the next several days, with warnings of flash floods. We enjoy the peace of staying at our condo and listening to the waves. We sit with arms wrapped around each other, remembering and basking in the glow of passion transmuted from flame into gold. I discover that simply saying this is a second honeymoon stirs Pat. I know Pat is a romantic; he cries at movies more than I do. What surprises me is that simply saying it is our second honeymoon awakens romance in him. Maybe I am too stingy with romantic words. Lesson learned: be the change you’d like to see. Huh.

I wish it could be that simple for Pat.

The hard thing about being in a relationship with someone on the spectrum is everything! They have different sensory reactions.. They have strong food preferences. They can’t read social cues. They won’t ask what’s wrong when you feel like crying or spontaneously get you a gift, something quirky they know you’ll like. They are sometimes socially awkward.

I am speaking in general terms. But I need to acknowledge that each person is different in the degree to which they are affected. For example, Pat makes astute judgments about social situations when he knows what the events are. He just has trouble reading people’s expressions.

Pat doesn’t get the big picture. When we are moving out of state and under pressure to finish packing, I ask him to pack the pictures. Several hours later he is still carefully wrapping each picture as if it is the Mona Lisa. I end up having to just dump things from his office into boxes because he never gets there. Telling him to hurry up doesn’t help. He sees it as necessary that his task be done right.

[Pat: From my Army days, I remember hearing “There’s never time to do it right, but there’s always time to do it over.” It’s a facetious way of saying “get it right the first time.”]

Fortunately, there are skills that go along with the problems. He has a wonderful aptitude for visual thinking. He can turn 3-dimensional molecules in his head. His hyperfocus allows him to persevere until a problem is solved. And once a problem is explained to him, he will try his best to find a solution. Once committed, he is committed, forever faithful. That’s a biggy.

I am still learning, after almost nine years, that a lot of our arguments are about how language is used.

He doesn’t seem to know what “go back to the beginning” means. I have a fresh example. He reads me a list of fast food chains from an article he is reading. I catch the last three but miss the first.

“________, Susie’s, Big Burger, Tennessee Dogs.”

“What was the first one? I missed it.”

His answer: “Tennessee Dogs.”

“Before that. At the beginning.”

“Big Burger.”

  I wise up. “Next?”

“Susie’s.”

“Before that?”

“Cinnamon Sugar Shack.”

Finally, I have my answer.

[Pat: In this case, I am on my computer and can’t get back to the page I was on. Where is it.... I’m stalling for time…. Now I have it…]

Oops, Pat catches me here in a “rash judgment.” It’s not that he doesn’t understand order, it is that he is speaking from memory while he is searching for the right page on his computer.

His speaking rhythm is slower than most people, and he pauses between sentences. I think he is done speaking when he is not. He hates being interrupted. I discover this is a common autistic trait. It explains so much! I could weep over the difference this will make.

He can’t follow the flow of conversation sometimes. This is also a trait. We will talk about something, and there will be an interruption. I will return to where the conversation stopped. He doesn’t know what I am talking about until I re-cue him. Or if we don’t restart it, he will assume we are done. For a long time, I don’t understand why he does that. It seems simple to me. But he processes language differently than I do.

If a detail on a spreadsheet is wrong, he will work on it until it is fixed. If I think this hyperfocus is getting in the way of getting something done, like getting a working budget, I lose patience. I want an answer now. I need answers from the budget, even a ballpark estimate, so we can determine our plan. Pat, on the other hand, gets stuck on details. We can drive each other crazy.

“Have you finished the budget yet?”

“I’m still working on getting the spreadsheet to cross-foot.”

“Aaaaaah!”

He can remember numbers used in a casual conversation and he assumes that is natural. When I ask him to repeat the numbers, he says, “I already told you.”

“We paid $32.15 for gas, $45.76 for food, and $13.26 on miscellaneous. More than I wanted.”

“I’m sorry, what did we pay for gas?”

“I already told you.”

“I don’t remember numbers like you do.”

“Aaaaaah!”

Sometimes I can be understanding. He’s not deliberately being difficult. Other times I can’t.

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Movement 4: Dolphin Day!

It’s my birthday today! I am 70. It is raining, with little wind and mild temperatures.

We venture out into the weather because there is one event I don't want to miss. We will swim with dolphins, a gift from my brother for my birthday. The location where this takes place is a very upscale hotel. I am intimidated by it at first, because we are dressed to meet dolphins, i.e. swimsuit and a generous caftan for me, a swimsuit (shorts) and a white T-shirt for Pat.

We head off to the lagoon where the dolphins are and put on life jackets that ride up in the water. There is no strap between the legs to keep them down. If I don't keep my legs pointed down, I bob like a cork, then tip over and spin instead of swim.  I can't return to upright! Someone comes over to right me and I pull down the life vest as far as it can go over my plus-sized belly. I somehow learn to swim and keep my legs from popping up, so I can manage to travel on my own, but not as well as the young kids with their slim, energetic bodies.

Pat has an even harder time. His belly is Santa-sized, and there is no way to pull the vest down far enough. There is no way he can maintain an upright posture once his feet leave the bottom. He is overwhelmed because he can’t get his gear to float him properly. He bobs like a cork with a fish on the other end of the line and needs to hold onto a dolphin to make forward progress. But oh what progress it is!

[Pat: All true. It’s really disorienting. But amazing…]

As long as we don’t mind looking ridiculous, it’s exhilarating to be in the water with these powerful and elegant creatures. One by one, they pull each of us through the water; we can feel the powerful strokes from their tail fins. Pat says the experience is amazing. I concur.

Their eyes are very unlike ours; I wonder what they see, what this is like for them. They’re all human-raised, several generations, and have been interacting with humans from birth. The trainer talks about how they teach them to do tricks, and I ask if the dolphins train them. She laughs and says yes, but I think to myself that she doesn’t understand what I am asking. They are not like pet sea dogs, who must be trained by repeated gradual instruction. I suspect the training is really about them deciding to do what we ask, and they see it as a game. After all, they don’t have anything else to do now.

The trainer says that these dolphins will not leave the cove because the open ocean is dangerous, and they would have to hunt their own fish. Here they are fed, trained, and cared for. They live a long life, longer than their wild cousins. In fact, at some dolphin facilities, the dolphins are let out into the open ocean, but they always return.

The experience of swimming with dolphins is unlike anything else. I have been in the water with dolphins, or stroked them, but never have I swum alongside them, or hanging onto their dorsal fin and letting them pull me along.

Suddenly it hits me. I see a parallel between communication difficulties and misunderstandings for Pat and me and for dolphin/human interactions. Of course, I am exaggerating. Pat and I are not separate species, but that is what makes it hard. We are both humans. We should reasonably expect to be able to communicate with each other, but differences in language and perception trip us up frequently.

 I am not going to start using hand cues or whistles to communicate with Pat. That would be demeaning. I am going to learn his language. It is like a dialect of English in some ways. It is not that different. In fact, the reason I didn’t notice sooner is because Pat and I communicate just fine most of the time. I have made progress in identifying some of the reasons for where we struggle. I am pretty good at seeing things from another person’s perspective but I also purchase a workbook that is designed to help both sides of a neurotypical/autistic couple to learn to communicate; both sides, not just one.

My dream is to maybe come to Hawai’i for a month or so next time. I could write and Pat could explore, and we could avoid tourist attractions, and not feel guilty. We could just stay in a cabin in the rainforest.

Hawai’i: Finding True Love.

What is true love? Is it romance? Is it having your feelings understood or your needs met? No. My relationship with Pat did not begin to improve until I accepted him as he is. I chose to say yes to being married to him. It’s not about me have my needs met. It’s about both of us freely giving of ourselves to each other.

[Pat: It was always about Ann for me. That never changed. I don’t have the same needs as Ann. Navigating the female perspective has always tricky for me. I express my love by acts of service.]

It is true that some of our difficulties are due to the basic differences between men and women, the things that all couples face. But in our case the difficulties are amplified, taken to a higher level. I am blessed to have Pat, who has cleaved to me (in the old language of the marriage vows) through all my drama before I understood and accepted my vow of cleaving to him.

 True love is willing the good of the other. It is sacrificial love. It is a choice.

I have been finding true love this whole time by learning to love Pat as he is. Pat has showed his love by caring for me when I was ill. We serve each other by loving each other and getting up out of the chair when we’d rather not, listening to the same story again, rubbing shoulders and feet, or making a favorite dish. In my case, it also means making the effort to communicate when it seems hard. I show it by spending time with him and including him in what I am doing. That is a delight.

Sometimes love means chocolate and flowers. Sometimes it means midnight runs to the Emergency Room. Sometimes it means sitting with your partner in sorrow. Sometimes it means sharing joy. True love is love that wills the good of the other, no matter what the weather is.

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Endnotes

Hawai՛i lost its sovereignty on July the 4th, 1898, when it was annexed by America. The annexation was done against the express wishes of the Hawai՛ian people and Queen Liliu’okalani, who traveled three times to Washington D.C. to plead for the protection of native Hawai՛ians and restoration of her rule. Sixty-one years later Hawai՛i became a state. I was six, but I remember it. The teacher stopped to point out the new star representing Hawai’i on the American flag.

Some indigenous Hawaiians would like autonomy and to be declared a tribe. Most don’t want it, but they fight to retain their culture. Native Hawai’ians earn almost the same income as Japanese, white and Okinawan residents, with about 6% below the census poverty line. Based on census data, 20% of Samoans are poor, and 50% of Marshall Islanders. The Marshallese community has suffered already, because their islands include Bikini and Eniwetok atolls, where nuclear bombs were tested.  

The Marshallese poverty may be in part because when they received independence a deal was made to deny them food-stamps. Food is extremely expensive, but even today they cannot receive them.

The island is also plagued by a significant drug problem, and government corruption.

Another problem–tourism is causing the creeping expansion of vacation rentals for tourists, reducing the availability of housing for year-round residents. People buy private condos or houses and convert them to rentals because it can be quite lucrative. Yet to get certified can take almost a year, unless the owners can grease the wheel. Giving gifts to someone with the power to help is a cultural practice.

A little known fact: Hawai’i hosts roughly 1000 species of fruit fly. Some 600 reside nowhere else. There are four species of invasive fruit flies. These are the ones that cause damage to human crops. Most of the endemic species (unique to the Hawai’ian Islands) are of the genus Drosophila which happens to be the genus I studied for my Ph.D. Humor me. By 2022, 416 endemic Drosophila species have been described: there other genuses besides Drosophila.

These native Drosophila are very different from the ones you see at home, and they are endangered due to habitat loss and invasive species. They are an important part of the native ecosystems. A loss is a loss whether the organism is cute or beautiful to our eyes. Yet some are indeed beautiful– for example Drosophila sylvestris, with long slender wings that are black-tipped with small graceful black marks and long legs.

Mahalo.