Well, there's no other way to say this, but to say it. I'm getting married! Someone caught the tiger by the proverbial tail. Just put me in a cage and clip my claws...haha. NEVER! I'll still have the same untameable spirit as ever. My dearest had told me that i always have such a cry in my voice when i lovingly talk about my two favorite uncles. Both on my fathers side, Uncle David & Uncle Buddy. I spent the most important years with them that are pivotal in my role as best uncle in the world, so says my nieces & nephews.

I remember spending a summer in Maui with my Uncle David, he was the oddest person i'd ever met, but i was never scared of his oddity, it made me feel free with mine. He had this huge cooler on the front lawn that was filled with beer and melted ice. He'd tell me, " You don't walk in here without getting a beer, you don't have to drink it, but bring it in." I remember now as my tongue calls the taste from my palate, of Olympia beer.  It was so rez, there were huge cracks in the wall, cane spiders could easily ome in through them. My Aunty Lani who had long nails came in and hugged me, i saw the spider on the wall that she walked passed, was still inside. I asked her to get rid of it, it was a big one. With her long nail extending from her index finger she stabbed it right in the abdomen, and it stuck on the wall.

Whenever we ate or talked at the table, my Uncle David would always make this weird face like something's really wrong, and i'd say, "what's a matter?" Then i'd look at where his hand was, he had a huge hand and would make it crawl like a spider under the table. I just excitedly exhaled, thinking about that....lost in a memory, scuse me. I think he was born a century too early, but don't take him back from my memory.

My Uncle Buddy was the oldest boy in my dad's family, but was always in style. Gosh...listening to Hawaiian music now is making it hard for me to write. They've passed for some time, these memories are mine, yet i want to share a slice of me. I feel like something i haven't felt for a long time now, this unsure confusion like when i used to write my poetry, So now, do i carry on like this, go back to where i started talking to myself, or close the page....?

I think uncles have this patience that we can all appreciate, Uncle Buddy & i would walk to the beachside every afternoon and watch the sunset with his granddaughter, I was a eager learner, wanting to spend time in the garage, but my asthma was damaging. I remember being in his study on his stool that he made, helping me with my math, and counting money....hehe counting money. There was this time we went to the bank, he withdrew some money, it must have been about $40, but he said, "Grab the bread."  I said, "What bread?" "Just take the bread." I don't see any bread."  So he took the money and exhaling with a shake in his head he said, "Bread is money, any time someone says take the bread, you take the money."  I said, okay i'll take it! He said, "Too late i was gonna give you half."  I waited for another time for him to say that, but it never came again, like a good opportunity. Lesson well learned! I was never upset that he never gave me the money afterwards, he treated me with that much respect, and i'd expect nothing less.

When we took my cousin, his granddaughter to swim practice at the YWCA. We'd stay in the car and talk and play Tic-Tac-Toe. He never let me win, and i ached to put my feet in the water, so he made a wager with me, that if i beat him at Tic-Tac-Toe, he'd let me spend fifteen minutes at the poolside. The entire summer except weekends, from 8 to 10am we'd play Tic-Tac-Toe, and pad after pad i'd lose, never learning the patterns, never sitting with my feet in my water. Then one day, the last day of swim practice, i beat him. The coolness of the water for those fifteen minutes was worth the entire summers heat.

The knowledge learned from lessons then have always stayed with me. And i've always prided myself for the outstanding job i've done of being an uncle, and every nephew and niece that sits on your blanket, you say, "i wish i had a kid like you." Now i'm at the step of that journey. I know i can go back and erase where i was struggling with a 10 ton pang, but my art has always been about openly expressing my pain and loss.

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