traveling alone

DeAnne Writes About Hawaii

I am changing the name of my Blog. My Not So Empty Nest is a Fairly Empty Nest and that’s not a good title for anything. Welcome to “DeAnne Writes About Herself”.  I have decided to own the fact that all I really want you to do is tell you stuff so no more false advertising. 

I am joining the History Chicks Podcast on a tour of the Boston area in October.  I had a credit with American Airlines so when I went to book the ticket two days ago I was going to use it but it was expiring this week! So, I did the only logical thing and booked a ticket to Hawaii on a flight leaving in sixteen hours.  I know the logic is weak.  I am spending more money than I would if I just let the ticket go but I didn’t want American Airlines to have it.  Which brings us to todays post.

I love Hawaii.  I feel a deep spiritual connection here.  I even had a dream one time that I was flying around Honolulu and all the buildings and sidewalk were made of wood and old fashioned looking.  I could hear Pele calling me saying, “Come.  Be a warrior.”  And when Pele calls Sister, you listen.  

I have been fortunate enough (through a friend with a connection at the Sheraton Waikiki) to be able to come here several times.  I’ve always had a canoe full of children and their friends with me and I would dream about how wonderful it would be to travel here alone someday. I would imagine what it would feel like to not spend the day making sure no one wanders off, get sun burned or drowns.   Children are not conducive to relaxation.  That is why when I found out my ticket was expiring I said, “I must go to Hawaii!”, and started to pack.  I still haven’t lost the thirty pounds I gained during Covid so my “resort wear” didn’t fit- at all.  I had no time to worry about it, or even care, so I threw a couple of floral California King bed sheets and some safety pins in my suitcase and figured I’d just make do. 

Not to sound overly dramatic but when I arrived in my hotel room and realized I had a view of Diamond Head and no children I fell to my knees and began to weep.  It’s a little cheesy to love Waikiki so much when there are so many more beautiful and peaceful places here on the Islands.  But, I do.  If you face one direction you see the beautiful ocean.  If you turn around and face the other way you see a Mall. Paradise.

In my haste to get here I forgot to pack a much needed hat.  After my cry in the room I scraped myself off the floor and immediately went to the hat store conveniently located in the hotel lobby.  The sales clerk looked at me and her eyes grew wide. “You are so white!”, she said.  “Promise me you won’t go outside!” ‘As if’, I thought to myself, ‘this skin hasn’t seen the sun since 1984.’ 

I am so happy to be here. The irony is I really miss my family but I will get over it. I can do whatever I want and I look adorable in my Bed Sheet MuMu. Mahalo nui au.

Stumped at Stumptown

I am in Portland by myself and I have come to find myself.  This is the fourth time I have come to Portland in the last three years.  I like it here but maybe I should start looking for myself somewhere else because I can’t seem to find anything here but coffee and books. Don and I were talking the other day and to paraphrase, because he said it nicer, “There is nothing to you anymore.  You just react to whatever is going on.”  It didn’t even make me mad because he is correct and like I said he said it nicer. I feel like a mouse (a really cute one) and Don and the kids are cats that bat me back and forth across the floor and I am just waiting in fear until they tire of the game and  pounce on me and eat me.

I am not sure why I don’t have much sense of self.  It doesn’t help that  my kids are very difficult and extremely willful.  They will never be mice and I admire that about them.  I want my girls to, as CEO Cheryl Strayhan says to “lean in”,  but they are leaning in so much they are knocking me over. My fault not theirs.

I have realized that the times in my life I was the most content and felt the best were times I was on the road or living out of the country.  Hence my need to travel alone now to try to recreate that feeling.  It was so simple and straightforward. I just went to work and went home.  I couldn’t look for another job. I was not worried about paying bills.  I felt more secure being who I was because no one really knew me.  I was a stranger in a strange land already different so it didn’t matter.  The only problem I ever had to deal with was the occasional producer who would ask me to work on my “attitude problem”.  Whatever.

Now,  how to recreate the feeling of well being and sense of self in my own world.  The only thing I seem able to recreate easily is the attitude problem.  Whatever.  I’m not sure how I am going to do this but you can be sure I will let you know when I figure it out and I will pontificate about how you should do the same thing.  On that subject,  never listen to anything I say.  Example: do not go off your anti-depressants or throw away your bathroom scale, at least not at the same time. It was a really bad idea.  Whatever.