“Going to Maui, tomorrow. Going to marry, Mary Oroqork.”
First I had heard of the island. Introduced by the Honolulu hotel’s entertainer at the sing-along piano bar. I was a visiting professor just arrived for a year in the seventies.
Didn’t go to Maui until Dad and my stepmother came to visit. We spent the night in a hotel there. ‘Red’ Elam rented a car. Drove down the east side of the island on Hana Highway, a 68 mile long stretch of Hawaii state roads that connected Kahului in east Maui with Hana. At the time, only part of the road was paved. Today known as The Road to Hana, boasting 617 curves and 56 bridges over 52 paved miles.
Then Dad decided we could drive down the west side—closed to tourists—because “this road’s as good as any West Texas oil road.”
Yes. Saw the 150-year-old Banyan tree at Lahaina, which may survive the wildfire that decimated Lahaina. Plants there usually prevail.
The plumeria flower, known in Hawaii as the heavenly flower, is used in many of the Hawaiian leis. The plumeria represents birth and love; spring and new beginnings.
Maui, grow again.
