Here we carreen toward the last week of a rollercoaster year, a cluster of holy days (“holidays”). Some folks are up, some down. Some have trees up and decked, lights lit, planning and shopping done, finalized their creative gifts, made their last mail deadlines for sending packages and cards out, and have planned their holiday family and special-occasion meals apples to nuts.
Some are more laid back, and yet find a way to celebrate without such organization and ritual. Some others, yet, tip toward the Bah Humbug! part of the scale and hope the whole, mad, secular fanfare, push to spend, and rush would be over and done.
It’s nice to believe some of us fall into the in-between of such categories and take time to reflect on the real meaning of the spirit of the season. Achiever-types typically find that there truly are not enough hours in a day. (Of course, daylight itself grew shorter up to Winter Solstice on Dec. 21.) Those who suffer from loneliness or depression may find that each day drags on interminably.
It would be my year’s-end wish, Dear Readers, that you — and most folks — will experience a feeling of gratitude and peacefulness this holiday season. And a feeling of being connected, one to the other within our individual families, ohana, and with the community as a whole.
Although our communities are growing, we are still pretty “down-homey” in our ability to know each other as we connect at the post office, bank and grocery store, the beach park and strolling the coastal path.
Beyond the Kalo Festival (first since the big rains), brunch with Santa, craft fairs, and shopping-center light shows and the Festival of Lights at the Historic County Building, there are the well-attended and fun annual Christmas parades on Rice Street and in Waimea, and then the plays and candlelit services in our churches and temples.
We can “meet” as we give to needy folks and tots without toys. We can meet and talk story as we donate to red-kettle Salvation Army bell ringers or plump up the Zonta fund or Food Bank shelves. We can meet as we join to bring cheer to hospitals, care homes and senior centers. Endless opportunities abound to give, to say our thank-yous, and to help others who may need a hand.
One of the types of things that seems to bond Kauai residents and visitors especially is a variety of “winter” musical concerts by the island’s various choral groups and musicians.
Many of these are free, such as donated, extraordinary holiday performances by Kauai Sings, and this year we had the bonus of this past weekend’s new Chamber Music Kauai orchestral and vocal concerts. Earlier came the Kauai Community College wind symphony, jazz band or orchestra concerts staged in the amazing KCC Performing Arts Center, and the numerous other choirs and entertainers for a donation or nominal fee. Many of these give public “teaser/pleaser” performances, too.
An admitted people-watcher, I enjoy taking my eyes off the performers long enough to catch people lighting up with smiles, bobbing heads in time, clapping enthusiastically, and rising to applaud.
No doubt exists in this mind that music is a language unto itself that transcends all, and that there are many talented musicians of all ages actively — and committedly — making such music together to offer us on our home island. A gift, indeed.
One of the nicest musical gifts of this year, for me, as a string player, was to watch a group of spruced-up kids from the Boys &Girls Club proudly file up on stage with violins, a viola and a cello to play with the KCC Orchestra backing them.
Their timing was good, the bows moved in unison without squeaking. As they performed, straight and tall, the concentration and focus of the young players of the newly formed (and still expanding) Kauai Opio and Keiki Orchestra was fully evident — and this after only a dozen lessons.
No doubt about it: Musicians need to make music; singers need to sing; good audience members have a strong desire to listen; creative people feel impelled to create; and human beings need each other and definitely find themselves uplifted by being positively connected.
Within our home, the book of carols is open on the piano, the sleigh is pretty much parked and the bubbly is chilling as we anticipate shared times with family and friends. A four-foot section of one of our papaya trunks blown over by strong winter winds has been transformed into a light-wrapped holiday “coconut tree” topped with Norfolk pine branches serving as pseudo-coconut fronds.
Now, garlanded with lights, studded with birds and a good luck nest, it’s planted securely in a bucket of sand wrapped in a drift of pseudo snow. This, our “tree of life” for 2019 is our favorite. Funny!
Each year’s Christmas tree is the “favorite” — of the moment. But then, each year of our lives, and each new morning that dawns with all possibilities, and each green flash that signifies we must expect — and appreciate — the unexpected, are also our favorites.
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Editor’s Note: Dawn Fraser Kawahara, resident author and poet, has focused her supportive interests within the Kauai community since the early 1980s. She and her husband, a retired biology teacher, share the passion of nature and traveling to far-away places. The writer’s newly released memoir and travel tale, “Burma Banyan,” and other books, may be found in local outlets and on Amazon. For further information, email her at tropicbirdpress@gmail.com.
