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"After the longest night, tomorrow we sing up the dawn. There is a rejoicing that, even in the darkest time, the sun is not vanquished. ... While the gentle winter sun slowly opens its eyes, let us all bring more light and compassion into the world." —Dacha Avelin |
| That 5000-piece jigsaw puzzle from last December was entertaining and fun until we finished the house, gazebo and rowboat—about 800 pieces. Then it became daunting and tedious. |
Just 4200 pieces too many. |
"Part of a nutritious breakfast," the ads say. Isn't the spoon also part of a nutritious breakfast? |
So we swapped it out for a 1000-piecer of these nutritious breakfast foods. I'm both proud and embarrassed to say that I have personally ingested countless bowls of 17 out of these 25 delicacies, as well as plenty of other varieties of sugar-coated garbage not made by General Mills, like Cap'n Crunch, Quisp, Quake, Fruit Loops, both Fruity and Cocoa Pebbles, and so on and on. Teenagers can get by on nearly anything. |
| In February I got back to the annual Kaimana Klassik Ultimate Frisbee Tournament, now held near Waikiki since the participants were evicted from the polo fields four miles from me for having a bit Too Much Fun. Never heard whether it was the excessive beer, or the naked games. But the goofy costumes and ludicrous team names have persisted, and Just Enough Fun. This player was on the Bag O' Wine team. |  Make up your minds, guys. Is it a bag, or a box? |
 Didn't you read the image? |
March brought our annual staff outing to the Honolulu Symphony Orchestra's performance of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, the quick and easy replacement of one breathing pacemaker (not even general anesthetic or a night in the hospital!), and the start of something big and fun.
Last summer, 15 members of the 1977-78 Stanford men's and women's gymnastics teams (and their spouses/partners) met up in Costa Rica (home of one of our senior members). They had a blast, and thought it would be great to expand that experience to include all 1978-79 team members, in another location. Extensive communication and planning commenced, and now 27 team members, their partners, and our coach are coming to Oahu in July! 'Twill be the 2026 StanfOahu Gymnastics Reunion, and I have already roughed out the design for T-shirts. Everyone is excited about hiking, Waikiki, ocean activities, eating poi, learning to pronounce "Kalanianaole," and maybe even throwing around a frisbee or six. Best of all for me, Ted Marcy, the former team member who just happened to be in the gym the day I got hurt, will be coming a day early and staying at my house with his wife Kim. Ted, who was a household name in 70s gymnastics, was interviewing for internships that day, and had stopped by the gym for a visit and a workout. He was the only one to see me fall, and being both a medical student and concerned that I hadn't gotten up, he came to check on me, asked all the right questions, and gave me mouth-to-mouth until the paramedics arrived. He was the first of several people to save my life. |
| In April the Ultimate Frisbee Association's season began, and I decided to root for the lone Bay Area team (what?!), the Oakland Spiders. I watched two or three games every weekend until the Boston Glory won in August. Ultimate absolutely belongs in the Olympics, but sadly, there are no plans to add it. These guys are impressively athletic, throwing, catching, running, dodging, leaping, colliding, and landing hard for 60 minutes. Every game is like an hour-long highlight reel from a week of NFL football. As athletes and entertainers they beat archers and skateboarders by miles. |
One of many reasons I love Ultimate. |
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Have these people ever seen someone paddle a real canoe? |
April also saw various combinations of friends accompany me to half a dozen UH Men's Volleyball games, with their requisite Hawaii Five-O Paddle Cam and other silliness. I was quite taken with the sportsmanship and modesty of one of our stars, Louis Sakanoko, from Paris. |  We cheered hard. |
 Parlez-vous? |
We cheered him on as long as UH was in the running for Nationals, and I made a couple of signs for Reyna and Grace to wave at their last game. Grace and Tanya met him after the game and gave him the signs. |
Grace made it onto the Jumbotron. She was terribly embarrassed because she's kind of shy. |
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Another Sakamoto ace! |
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Hawaiian style: bring your favorite pig! |
The annual I Love Kailua Town Party did not disappoint, and my favorite photographer, Shane Myers, was there with a new offering, which I could not resist. One now hangs over my front door. Sadly, Shane snagged the pic by asking the fisherman who had just caught the octopus to let him go just long enough for a portrait. Soon after his moment of fame, he was dinner. |  But his memory lives on. |
| And finally, April brought my 65th birthday and all the joys of Medicare. Nancy eased the pain greatly, guiding me through the morass of options, choices, selections, decisions, alternatives, and possibilities. |
 Was it Beethoven, or Mozart? |
In May Tanya and I caught the Honolulu Symphony Orchestra, a slice of POG (Passion Fruit, Orange and Guava) pie, and, apparently, a sunburn. |  As good as it looks. |
 Native to Bolivia, where they grow on cliffs. At least that's what Google AI says, so you know it's true. |
And then I stumbled onto a very cool cactus, a Monkey Tail. I now have three. It looks prickly but it's actually fuzzy. |
| And the unusual plants kept coming. In my search for native Hawaiian plants to include in the stained glass I'm designing (see below), Grace and I dove into the forest looking for Blue Morning Glories. Found a beauty! But she didn't last, since her roots were impossible to find in the tangled undergrowth of the forest. Better yet, we found and liberated a blue ginger. It's gorgeous and I want to put 10 plants in my yard. There are several growing in Grace's Mom's gihugical garden and she brought some here. |  Glorious Blueness. Should I be putting periods after these fragments? |
 News flash! Purple tops orange! |
My front door had a good year too, especially in June, sporting not only our late eight-legged friend, but also a new color and a Green Man sculpture I found on Etsy. The studio that fashioned my Green Man has all kinds of sculptures, in all kinds of finishes, from a great variety of cultures: Greek, Roman, Egyptian, Babylonian, Chinese, Japanese. For my office wall, I got a Dionysus, Greek god of wine, grapevines, winemaking, fertility, ritual madness, religious ecstasy, festivity, and theatre. Who can't use one or two of those? |  Pick your two. Praying is supposed to help, or killing a goat with an obsidian knife under a full moon. |
 And they smell magnificent. |
The pretty plant parade proceeded apace with the 20 yellow gingers Grace grew outside my office, and when I spotted Purple Anthuriums at a Kailua Farmer's Market in July. I had never cared for red or white anthuriums (too primarily-colored), but I brought the purples home, where they completed my favorite color transformation from 60 years of orange! Turns out that Kailua has two Farmer's Markets every Saturday, and monthly ones on Thursday, Friday and Saturday! Two are at night, and I hope to catch one the day after Christmas. |  Purple wins again! |
 Nine flavors of baklava. I tried four. |
I've become a frequent attendee at the Sunday markets. The outdoor one, with more food, has offered fare and people from Sri Lanka, India, North Africa, Lebanon, Germany, Japan, China, Thailand, Mexico, Argentina, and dear old Hawaii. Everyone is friendly, and many bring kids and dogs. |  If the outdoor market looks too rainy, we go to this one, under a huge parking lot roof. |
 I added matcha to the list of soft green things I don't like. |
 Half the vendors change every week. They are happy to whomp up an improvised veggie variation. |
| The first pacer surgery was so breezy, I replaced the other side in July, also in the space of five hours. Nancy flew out for both operations, and we had a nice visit each time. My goal was to pace sitting for more than an hour. That has not happened, but my pacing time lying down feels stronger and has increased by maybe three hours a day. |
 Original Fire, inspired by a piece of Pele that Reyna found in 2013. |
After first dreaming up Hawaiian Goddesses of Earth, Air, Fire and Water 25 years ago, and collecting images of backgrounds, poses, hands, feet, faces and hair, I decided to finally turn them into stained glass panels in September. I found the only stained glass program there is, apparently, written for Windows in 2000, and amazingly still running flawlessly on Windows 11. I had to buy a Windows 11 laptop, but the program is exceptional, offering every feature I can imagine needing to design, create and print stained glass art. I have pushed its limits hard and it doesn't seem to even notice. It comes with 3500 samples of actual glass you can order, though the program is so old, they send the samples on a CD. |  Fire, output by Glass Eye 2000. |
 Original Air, largely ripped off from one of my favorite artists, Alphonse Mucha. He was the most famous Art Nouveau artist, except maybe Tiffany. |
The journey to creating four 2'x4' stained glass panels, which will fill my living room window, has proved fascinating, and I'm only halfway through. Progressing has been has been exciting and educational: from idea; to cut-and-pasted parts; to layering, resizing, rotating, coloring and placing the parts; to restyling the composition through another art program; to importing and tracing designs in Glass Eye; to imposing the many limitations that actual glass requires; to accepting the many compromises within the process.
The lady who finally fixed my stained glass chandelier correctly will be doing the actual work. She's been doing this for 30 years and has used Glass Eye since it came out, so I can just send her my files and she can correct my newbie mistakes: inside points, uncuttably thin or small or sharp curves, and 20 other details I'm learning on YouTube videos. |
 Air, output by Glass Eye 2000. |
 Peppermint from Japan. |
I returned to Waikiki this year for Halloween after avoiding it since COVID began. A few great homemade costumes, as always. |  Not 100 legs, but plenty. |
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Have fez. Will travel. |
Something for everyone! |
Webhead Invasion! |
 Yes, a "cauldron." Look it up. |
I also decorated the house, enlarged my cauldron of bats, and added a pair of black resin hands I found on Etsy. |  Should I let the small ebony creature out? |
| In November I finally installed a backup battery for the entire house. And my wonderful staff, cheerful, flexible, reliable, and stable for many months, began to disperse: Khea to long-term physical therapy, Brandon to Rhode Island, Cass to Ecuador, Jeremy to Straub Hospital. Hiring time again.
I stay "active" with Common Cause Hawaii, but that doesn't mean a lot these days. The executive director is a fireball—though very disorganized—and only needs us to rubber stamp his plans every month or so. |
| I continue to test and benefit from the MouthPad^ that Jeff introduced me to last year. Looks like I bit through a wire, though! They are sending me a new one this week. |  I have no excuse. |
 Oldest friends and new. |
Nancy came in early December, requesting a party, which of course took place. |  Zari's hat, given to Brodie the Younger by Jen 30 years ago, is missing a B. |
 Big, blue, beautiful. |
We also played Sherlock Holmes, and transplanted Mom's memorial gardenia into a large pot, appropriately blue, courtesy of Grace. A lovely way to end the year. |