Re-entry

Hunter on the fields of Mauna Kea

Out there in the middle of that big, beautiful ocean, 

on more than one occasion, I witnessed the brilliant, burning trail of an object falling from space.

Much bigger and brighter and closer than a shooting star, 

it made me sit up, from my dreamy, introspective, star-gazing, night -watch and pay attention.

The idea of it bewitched me;

that this man-made-chunk-of-something-or-other, 

had been "out there", 

getting the God's-eye view,

witnessing the whole, gorgeous, tragic, sparkling, circus going on down here.

It had blipped along, doing its job,

gathering information, 

eavesdropping on international secrets, 

broadcasting "The Simpsons" to someone's hut beside the Ganges,

and all while floating around in an infinite and un-answerable Universe...

Nifty stuff.

However, returning to Earth from that  great vacuum of awesomeness, where nothing slows you down?

That's the tricky part.

An object falling from space is carrying crazy amounts of kinetic energy,

Its not at all going the same speed as everything else down here...

so it smashes into our atmosphere and  squashes all the air molecules and just burns shit up.

I can relate to  this feeling.

We came in from the Yonder and  the Blue after two years in Paradise,

and instead of feeling, like super-chilled out and groovy cruisers...

There was some serious turbulence.

Our MOLECULES were having a hard time.

It felt  a little like being  a soda bottle that someone had shaken with the top still on.

All that built up energy, we had gained from living a Life full of risk and adventure,

worldly worries on a way back burner, a clear  and blue horizon on every dawn,

and now, here we were back in "reality'?

Where we could just go to the store and buy ice?

A few weeks ago, we were sailing the high and robust Seas,

embracing our inner badass,  following our Bliss,

feeling fairly certain we had this whole thing pretty figured out

and feeling pretty awesome as we sipped our morning coffee and watched every sunrise with a swell of gratitude.

A week back in "reality", a couple of trips to Target, and suddenly it felt like...

We don't own a car anymore?

Dude, we don't even have a phone plan...

Holy crap!

What have we done?

What the hell are we gonna do?

It's amazing how quickly one's perspective can change.

It took a few long talks and about two weeks of meditation

to realize that this was just re-entry.

The burning trail of blazing in from the realm of pure potentiality and smashing into the atmosphere of fear and expectation,

of consumerism and the plain old unpleasantness of finding more bills waiting us for than residual checks.

Yes, there was some disintegration...

but this process is also part of the adventure.

It has given us the opportunity to rise from the ashes and reinvent ourselves

( once again)

and realize that it is possible to be back in our world AND maintain the open field of possibility.

When you go to Space,

Rock it like a rocket,

then re-enter the atmosphere, with your burn shield and your parachute,

and come on home.

Everyone goes through some version of this in their lives.

Experiences or realizations change us and when

we come out of the void and re-enter our lives, 

It hurts a little...

we blaze a trail,

and set the atmosphere on fire,

But you never know,

maybe somewhere out there,

someone on an Ocean of darkness

will look up,

and see you burning in, 

brighter than a falling star...

and they'll think;

"Geeze, Loiuse, look at that...", 

and wonder.

Today, we are still anchored in Hilo bay.

No one has hassled us, or made us move or pay anything to be here,

We have fallen in love with Hilo and its funky, laid back, beauty.

The weather has been wonderful, the locals warm and friendly,

The Grandmas came to visit and it was great, 

the kids are happy, 

we've walked volcanoes and swam in waterfalls,

There's more turtles here than anywhere i've ever been...

Sure, we need to find work,

Kai and Hunter will have to hit the schoolbooks for awhile,

but we're not done...

there are future missions to be had.

For the next few months, we will do what we need to and ready ourselves and Pura Vida for another phase,

( fill the coffers! winterize our warm-weather cruiser for higher latitudes!)

I may post a little less often as there are longer-format writing projects, I want to tackle now that I have to spend a little less time hunting and gathering on a daily basis

but we love our following and  our virtual crew

and we hope that you'll still check in on us occasionally.

it's time to rest, repair, surf a lot and assimilate all the information we gathered on our orbit,

and get ready for the next big launch date…

Kai and dad hike the sulfur flats of the volcano