The Lava Tube Hale #1

“Can’t walk 3 ft without a headlamp in O.V.”

Dear Verna,

Oh man. I’m so sorry for the huge delay in this email! You might have thought we died in our first week living at the Lava Tube Hale and just no one found us yet. Little Bug-a-boo wandering around wet, starving, and lost. Well, we’re alive!! But just barely.

The only one of us who moved fluidly and beautifully was Vincente. Go figure. All that research on how to move a cat was totally unnecessary. What a perfect little alien that boy is. For more reasons than I can count our little dog is really a pig, and our cat is a dog.

I have been taking notes since last Sunday, moving day, to compile an email for you. I have this ‘Verna’ page in my journal that I scribble little things down and hopefully am able to interpret now. Hahah!! Example, 2×4” is a note… can’t remember why at the moment. So Sunday was moving day because the day the bed moved was the day that we moved. For obvious reasons. I had done my best to get things semi-setup with some minor ‘glamping’ comforts but we were still using a cooler with ice, a generator for lights, a butane stove and propane grill, and a pressurized rinse kit for dishes. But since we’re waiting for our electric permit to go through to hook up our electric, that’s the way it was going to be for a while. BUT a lot of these glamping sites come with a personal chef so I figured I was quite set as one of the occupants of one of the nicer glamping options. Now I know when you were young, you were running around with just a toothbrush, a volleyball and a bathing suit. MY HERO. But I’m a panty! When I travel, my suitcase has wheels, my showers have to be hot or my chicken skin rises to absurd heights, and Lover usually serves me my hot coffee in a bed that isn’t below a leaky roof that could qualify for one of those ‘please help us fix our house’ pleading videos for a home transformation. I could go on but then we could add ‘whiney’ to the list of my not so admirable qualities. 😀

But as always, everything has sorted itself out. While moving, the coffee pot broke in a box that fell apart coming down a pathway far after dark and so our first morning was t-shirt strained coffee from the mixer bowl that was stove capable. We swallowed lots of grinds but we HAD to set a morning coffee precedent! It’s like the tradition that on new years day you don’t clean a thing. Bumbai you set a precedent that you will clean all year! These things must be monitored. ;D

So Sunday was the move. I had already been moving things down there all week but Lover had Sunday and Monday off so those were the days the big things went because I had the 6’6” Viking muscle. I’d drive back to the art barn Tue and Wed while Lover was at work to clean for the new tenant who would move in that week. We borrowed Greg’s truck and away we went! I had to return the truck that night so Lover stayed at the Hale with Bug to set up his stuff, pop down to Malama Market and get dinner stuff while I drove back to Kona for the car switch. I took what I knew would be my last hot hot shower with fabulous water pressure in an enclosed shower with no wind. I soaked that shit up!! I did all the main maintenance as if I was preparing for my 40 days in the desert; made sure I was shaved all over, shampooed and conditioned, facial masked and then facial scrubbed. The level of pre-planning I’d have to live with for this little while was already in full effect!!!

Right after the shower I got a call from Lover. I was imagining he had a list of last minute things to grab or he was checking what I wanted for dinner. “Bug-a-boo and I just had a near death experience” he said with a quivering voice. Now when a man of that size, stature, and age is scared, your heart just falls into your foot. And here I was, over an hour away, unable to help. ‘The lantern… everything caught on fire. The bed caught on fire and I caught on fire and little bug-a-boo…’ with his pause I just started crying. ‘Bug is okay. I’m okay. The bed isn’t okay. I couldn’t get the rinse kit to spray, I put everything out with beer.’ Oh thank you God. Maybe that crazy big Virgin of Guadalupe statue he made me haul back from Merida to put in the grotto was looking after them that night while I was away. But now, whenever someone asks what the heck happened that night I reply, ‘I wasn’t there!!!! THAT’S what happened!!!!’ Poor Lover was so shook we went to bed with no dinner that night, the generator on and the lights blaring to shoo away the fears. Remember when I said I just love how close you guys are to us?! If I ever come screaming down the road naked and scared, at least you’re close?! That’s not funny anymore. Okay maybe just a little ;).

So that day was over and behind us with lots of lessons learned, and we were forging ahead. Bug had just the tips of her hair burned in a weird water pattern so she was looking like a toasted marshmallow and smelled of awful burnt hair. I got most of the burn hair off her with the metal cap of a Perrier bottle and shampooed the rest of it out. Lover diagnosed that she never really knew she was on fire, but just that when he freaked out, he scared her, which sent her (on fire) into her little pet condo where he smothered her down all while he was still alight. What a dad. 😀 We went to lowes for necessities to fix the gate, get the guts for the new toilet that you gave us, thank you!!, trash cans, more gas cans, tubing to syphon water from the water tank to the toilet tank. More locks to lock up the structure on the lanai we are using for our closet, batteries, solar lights, and tons of other shit. We were checking out and we saw Donna, our girlfriend from Miloli’i  (she’s another one I can go running to if we ever need anything. Come to think of it, I still have her cold travel cooler for champagne when she came to see the property after we closed on it… must return). Between you two, we have GOOD family very nearby and that just makes me feel safe and a little less in survival mode. My creativity really can’t live in survival mode I’ve found. I have to feel even just a little bit safe and in control for my creativity to wander. Not much! But some of the main things have to be stable. ;D

So we see Donna at Lowes, I get a hug, we don’t exchange stories, just love, we walk out to Kashmir, Lover’s BMW battle wagon that has so many layer of spray paint art on it I’d love to just peel back one huge layer of paint one day to reveal the original gold ‘Kashimir’ color below. BUT it’d be bare for about 7 seconds. Just enough time for Lover to get another idea of what to paint on there covering the last layer of ‘$1.50 Hot Dogs’ he’s been rollin for the last few weeks. Currently on the hood is a layer of orange vinyl fabric or Mexican oil cloth…another keepsake I had to find space for when we came back from our vacation in Merida. 24 yards he wanted!!!!! I cut him down to 2 colors, 6 yards each. That stuff weighs so much. Okay so we’re heading out, back to Kashmir and there is a huge puddle under the gas tank. We roll up and there’s a guy there who was waiting to see who’s car that was so they didn’t just drive off into an explosion worthy of a Bond, James Bond, film. My God. BUT, we did roll away and straight to Napa for a fuel tank patch kit. At this point there wasn’t an accounting of recent events… we were just in ‘solve and move forward’ mode. We would take a retrospective later when we weren’t a rolling fire hazard. It would have taken us a couple days of non-events anyhow to even be able to have that retrospective. And there we have it. Why this email is so late…

So in sum total of the first 2 days, I have a private chef! I’m totally glamping. Bug’s toasted mallow color is fading, I’m constantly monitoring Lover like a scrutinizing Grandmother (wonder who I learned THAT from hahaha!!) and we LOVE LOVE LOVE our new OV life. #ka’ukulture is a beautiful culture. Okay more next time. We are on day 12 and I’ve only gotten through 2 of them.

Love you both so much. And just to reiterate, we are all good.

With greatest Aloha,

KK