Bob’s Reflections of a Wanna Be Paniolo

By R.K. Lindsey Jr.

Reflections of a Wanna B Cowboy is the author’s fifth book. Reflections is essentially Lindsey’s autobiography written in “talk story” format. Talking story is a way of communicating among locals in the islands. Lindsey and his grandson Samuel Kamaile are its main characters. Its basic message is, we are global citizens.

Author’s Statement

Reflections of a Wanna B Cowboy is my personal life story. Reflections is a story about an unfulfilled dream. I wanted so much as a kid to be a cowboy on the Parker Ranch when I became a man—a dream I dreamed countless times. But as oft happens to so many of us, this life force called destiny intervened and altered my plan. With my oldest grandson Samuel’s help as facilitator, in this autobiography of sixty snippets, I tell my story for our grandsons to remember their Tutu (grandma) and me by. Reflections has a larger message: we are citizens of the world.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Sep 22, 2018
• ISBN: 9781984554031

R.K. Lindsey Jr.

R.K. Lindsey, Jr. writes about his deep love for Hawai’i and things Hawaiian. Waimea I ka La’I is his seventh book. A book about his memories growing up as a Keiki o ka ‘Aina (child of the land).to Waimea. It is specially written for his grandsons. Lindsey was born and raised in Hawai’i. He retired from his position as a Trustee with the Office of Hawaiian Affairs after thirteen years in November 2020. His wife Kathy is a preschool teacher. They have three sons and four grandsons.

Book preview

Copyright © 2018 by RK Lindsey, Jr..

Library of Congress Control Number:    2018911110

ISBN:                Hardcover                               978-1-9845-5394-2

                           Softcover                                978-1-9845-5393-5

                           eBook                                       978-1-9845-5403-1

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

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Rev. date: 10/11/2018

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Contents

Dedicated with Aloha

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Dedicated with Aloha

KATHY

   "You are five sweet Hawaiian blossoms

strung in a lei of heavenly fragrance-plumeria,

   pukenikeni, pikake, pakalana, awapuhi."

Lono & Kara:

¹ Samuel Kamaile

² Elliot Kahikinaokala

Imiola & Bianca:

³ Lalamaika’i

⁴ Grandson on the way

Before I married, I had three theories about raising children and no children. Now, I have three children and no theories.

John Wilmot

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It’s a beautiful brisk sunny ‘see forever’ autumn morning in Waimea. Our picturesque ranching village nestled in a crease at the floor of the Kohala Mountains on the northern tip of the largest Hawaiian Island. How do I know it’s an autumn morning? Not because the leaves are turning from one stunning color to another. They’re not. You won’t find maples in Hawai’i. Our tropical climate and maples are what oil is to water. We don’t experience the beautiful graphic overt seasonal segues in the islands-summer > fall > winter > spring-as folks in swaths of North America enjoy along the edges of the 49th parallel where the U.S. meets Canada.

Change is in the air. I know it is. The ambient temperature plummeted ten degrees. On the tip of my nose. The edge of my ears. And, in my bones as I was fetching our newspaper. Several blasts of cold air greeted me when I opened our deck door. Invading our warm kitchen fraught with the alluring smells of corn bread, cinnamon rolls, bacon and percolating coffee. In an instant. Although I was outfitted for a dog sled trek to Nome. A deep chill still rippled through my warm body. I grab our worthless newspaper. Dust the water beads off of the plastic sheet which the paperboy had smartly wrapped it in. And, quickly retreat back into our cozy kitchen to escape the ‘wintry’ morning.

I see the change from autumn to winter high-lighted in yellow on the John Deere Tractor calendar hanging from our foyer wall featuring stunning fall scenes from Bangor, Maine and Marquette, Michigan. And, I’ve been anticipating the annual reminder phone call from my mother-in-law, Barbara Hassing, to reset our clocks. Bob, we’re on Daylight Savings Time now in San Francisco. We’ll be two hours ahead of Hawai’i rather than three for the next two months.

After a stormy night in our ordinarily quiet tranquil isolated corner of the Pacific Ocean. We needed a sunny day to wake up. To recover from an extraordinarily hellish night. A night rumbling with frightening rumbling thunder rolls. Lightning flashes. Howling wind. Pelting hail stones. And ua hau (snow) rain. It was a surprise attack from the eastern Pacific. Tropical Storm Bubba after being downgraded from a Category 1 Hurricane made an abrupt course change. Thus, Doppler radar was not able to give us ample warning. The alert came when the tempest was right on top of us. Barreling down on our sleeping island in the dead of night like a squadron of F-18’s assigned to take out an Al Queda training camp in a single air strike.

Throughout the night. God’s ominous and awesome power was resplendent all around us. Then at 5:47 a.m. the storm drifted out to sea and out of sight. The morning sun made a grand entrance from behind a huge curtain of black clouds which had captured the night sky. And held us hostage since dusk rolled over Waimea twelve hours ago. The transformation from stormy night to sunny day has been utterly magical.

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A black sky quickly turned turquoise blue. A choir of cardinals nesting in the loblolly trees lining our long winding driveway begin to whistle and chirp happily. Belching cheerful piercing melodies from deep within their narrow throats.

Kimo, our neighbor’s donkey starts to bay loudly. He’s having a psychotic explosion. Going totally bonkers. Then Matilda, his overly ‘in heat’ mate, decides to join him. She starts to bawl. Making a dreadful situation even more daunting. The two are like an angry couple having a domestic dispute of the worst kind. A quarrel, if police were summoned to settle would risk bodily harm. Possibly, fatal injuries. Their haunting mournful hideous wails ricochet off of the surrounding hills. The pair’s cries are then picked up by a gentle tradewind. The soft current lifts their senseless noise up into a clear sky. Their nasal hee-haw screams slowly melt. Disappear into thin air.

In the minutes that follow. I cannot believe what I’m seeing. After all that fuss. All their insane hoopla. They kiss. Make up and venture to opposite corners of the pasture. Both then start to moon each other. Give each other the ‘ass.’ That’s what ‘dramatic play’ for donkeys, I guess is all about. Thank God, their fussing. Their ‘donkeying around’ is over. Peace returns to our little neck of paradise. Quiet is restored. It’s just another day in ‘Aina Momona.’ Our ‘Paradise of Plenty.’

I watch a pair of kolea (golden plover) scampering about foraging on our front lawn. Precious real estate both staked a claim to five years ago after a long flight from Juneau, Alaska on a jet stream over the world’s largest ocean. When their tired wiry legs touched down on Hawaiian soil for the first time. The disciplined couple show up every November 5th for a well-deserved five month respite. And return to Alaska in April. On April 17th to be exact. They have a built in GPS to help them find their way here and home again.

Our golden retrievers who ran off during the night to seek shelter from the storm in a safe clandestine place came staggering home an hour ago. Disheveled, hungry, tired, smelly and thirsty. They plunk themselves on a couch reserved for them on our spacious lanai. They know the worst is over. That life is returning to what they want it to be. What they are accustomed to. Although their food and water trays have been replenished. They are too tired to eat. And too tired to drink. Their droopy eyes tell me they just want to catch up on their sleep. I let them be. In minutes they’re doing the Hound Dog Cantata in D Major in four parts. The contentment on their golden faces is reassuring. It tells me, Canine Heaven is a ‘dog friendly’ place. I tell my loyal cat, Hina, sitting in my lap that God has a special place in heaven for felines too. When it’s her time to transition to the boneyard on a ‘cloud.’ There will be a special place for her beyond the sunset. She gives me a trusting smile and reburies her furry head in my lap.

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From our expansive deck I have a six dimensional view of Waimea. Our beautiful town of green, gentle, rolling, oft mist laden hills. Hills on which Angus and Hereford cattle and horses roam freely. A place some liken to vistas they’ve seen in the high lands of Scotland and Ireland or New Zealand’s North Island. The native side of my family has had the wonderful privilege of stewarding, living in and having a spiritual, cultural, emotional and physical connection to this special place for twelve centuries. The southern book end of an archipelago stretching 1400 miles to Kure Atoll. Kure, being the other book end. Mark Twain described The Sandwich Islands as The loveliest fleet of islands that lie anchored in any ocean. In many ways it is. He forgot to mention expensive. Through, over and across forty eight generations. Through, over, and across the best and worst of times. We have been spectators to life’s only enduring constant: CHANGE. Change for better. For worse. For change’s sake.

Welcome to Waimea. To my ku’u home (home). To the place where in my childish dreams I yearned to be a paniolo (cowboy) on the Parker Ranch. Riding dusty, twisting, lonely, rock strewn and some-times muddy trails before sunrise and in the pale moonlight. Whistling those familiar songs of the West that I learned in Mr. Henry Keomalu’s 4th grade class. The sun beating down on my rugged, weather beaten face. Sculpted by time, hard work, nature and bar room scraps. Lasso in hand, roping unruly steers at First Gate and wild cattle on Mauna Kea’s rugged slopes. Shears in hand, barbering sheep at the remote Humu’ula Station situated between three of our great mountains-Mauna Kea, Mauna Loa and Kilauea. And, after a long day loading cattle aboard the Steamship Hualalai at the Port of Kawaihae. Falling off to sleep beneath an ancient kiawe (mesquite) tree, under a star drenched sky. The Pleiades, Big and Little Dipper, Cassiopeia, North Star, Orion, Venus and Milky Way hovering overhead like Christmas ornaments hanging from a Christmas tree. This heavenly portrait disturbed periodically by a cascade of falling stars. A cluster of comets shooting across the firmament. Or an asteroid crumbling, incinerating into a thousand pieces as it crashes into Earth’s atmosphere.

I so much wanted to follow in the boot steps of a long line of legendary Parker Ranch paniolo (cowboys). Legends, whose biographies are preserved in our Paniolo Hall of Fame. Legends, whose memories live on in the minds of little boys with big dreams like me. When I was young. I so wanted to be a Hawaiian paniolo (cowboy). But across time as often happens. Old dreams fade into oblivion. Only to be replaced by new ones. Reality intervenes. This life force some call Destiny. Others, the Future encroached. Interfered with. Botched up. Stole my dream right out from under me.

Now at 70. I’m dusting the cobwebs. Scrubbing the algae, lichens and barnacles off of my ancient dream. A dream dormant for six decades. Rising now out of the dust bin of history like a cobra from the bottom of a ceramic pot. I want to be a cowboy again. A wanna be Parker Ranch Paniolo (Cowboy) in the winter of life. Riding the wide open range through fields and meadows of saffron colored fountain grass. Thick green kikuyu pastures. Pods of prickly cactus. And, groves of eucalyptus. Riding past extinct volcanic cinder cones, ohia, mamane and koaia forests. Pursuing, chasing an elusive dream under a big Hawaiian sky. A ‘silver panther,’ resuscitating by-gone memories. Reliving happy, special times. Breathing new life into a fairy tale long asleep. Like Rumpelstiltskin. I’m ready to awaken from a long slumber. Like a tightly bound rose bud. Eager to burst open.

I hope my reflections will be useful to our three precious grandsons; Samuel, Lalamaika’I, Elliot and he who is ‘baking in the imu (oven).’ In knowing, understanding and appreciating a thin slice of my past. And, Kathy’s (their tutu-grandma). A part of their ancestral DNA record; who, what, where and from whence we came. Told through STORY. Special stories which I hope will provide them with useful insights, wisdom, ethics and values to live by. Special memories which link them to their past yet are pliable enough to allow them to ride seamlessly, readily, nimbly, confidently, unafraid into an uncertain and an ever and quickly changing but exciting future. This STORY is MY GIFT to YOU. TO ALL OF YOU.

In the sharing these reflections. I’m fully aware context is essential. That I’m obliged to build a strong and sturdy hale pohaku (house built on rock). To which I will add thick walls, a strong door, fireplace and a sturdy roof. A warm house in which to shelter, store, preserve and hold these reflections. These memories for all time.

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Thus I start with my ku’u home. Waimea. The town I was raised, played, lived, and worked in for a life time. A place I swore I would never abandon. Ever leave. And did not. It’s Home. Where my ashes will rest when God taps me on my shoulder to tell me, "Bob. Time’s up. Your work is pau (done). I hope he will conclude with, Come, my good and faithful servant. You’ve served me well. Follow me." And, as we walk through the ‘Pearly Gates.’ St. Peter will give my uhane (spirit) an E Komo Mai welcome with a scroll detailing the dos and don’ts of heaven to read at my leisure. And, his angel assistant, a hug, double plumeria lei, coconut water and the keys to my ocean side hale pili (grass house).

Waimea, the place I will forever be loyal to. Who, when Kathy and I were planning to ‘tie the knot.’ She unwittingly, innocently asked, Where will we live? A very practical question coming from a very practical and beautiful lady. The creature of habit I am replied. Without missing a beat, Waimea. Waimea. And Waimea. Two sons, two wonderful daughters-in-law, four grandsons and fifty years later, Waimea is still our kuu