August 10, 2005

Leaving Paradise

Paintbox Skies Keaukaha Big Island Hawaii



It was on this day in 1842 that Herman Melville left the Marquesas Islands and hopped a whale ship back home, an experience that became the subject of his first book. He had signed onto a whaling ship in 1841, he was in need a job. It was a great adventure at first. He got to see sperm whales, sailed along the coast of South America, and saw the Galapagos Islands. He was looking forward to the Pacific Islands. He had heard it was like a paradise. The weather was perfect, and the women were beautiful and scantily clad. But by the time the ship reached there, the captain had grown sick and he was treating his men worse and worse. And so Herman Melville jumped ship and went off on his own. He snuck over the side of the ship in a downpour, swam to shore, and headed into the jungle, knowing only a few of the native words and phrases.

He came upon a village of friendly people and lived with them for four months. He came to believe they were far more civilized than any Europeans or Americans. Men and women wore the same clothing. Both went bare-chested, a skirt of cloth, wore jewelry, loved to dance, and were free with their sexuality.

And he noticed that though they were forced to live off the land and build their own homes, there were no poor people. Nobody went hungry. He wrote, "There seemed to be no cares, griefs, troubles, or vexations... There were no foreclosures of mortgages, no bills payable...or to sum it all up in one word—no money."

He found his life luxurious, but he was worried if he stayed too long he'd never leave. So on this day in 1842, he found an Australian ship in need of crew, and he hopped aboard. It took him more than a year to get back to the U.S., and when he got home, he told his sister a sanitized version of what had happened to him in the Marquesas. She urged him to write it down, and that became his first book, Narrative of a Four Months' Residence Among the Natives of a Valley of the Marquesas Islands, which was a huge success, but it plagued Melville for the rest of his life—his readers always expected him to write more tales of exotic adventures in the Pacific.

Todays entry from the Writer's Almanac


I feel Mr. Melvile's pain totally. With the trouble with the house and stuff... I see Dog the Bounty Hunter in the old neighborhood,down in Puna, grabbing bond jumpers, and crying over his Mom's grave in Alae....I cry too...

Every new person we meet that finds out where we are from has got to have the answer to the 64 dollar question..."WHY?"

I ask myself that alot.

Our new painter guy is a local boy tough guy, with a big heart... 24, and wants to go to Hawaii " to see the girls" I told him to take a friend and go and BE CAREFUL, and leave the wahine and the pakalolo (girls and marijuana)alone, and watch out for the mahu's ( very pretty women who were or are pretending NOT to be guys...). He's doing a great job and cleaned up all the mess on the walls, and he will be painting and DONE by Friday. Father and son painter guys are flat out ticked about how things have gone for us and are really doing their best to get things fixed up.

Floor man comes in the morning and cant wait to rock and roll on the floor covering, now if I can just get the hot water on, hey I can move in...

Inspector man icomingng to tell us how much damage has been done and hopefully we can get the gas turned on when the gas man commeth

Amazing what you can do if you just do it...

I guess Melville figured it out, doing nothing gets you no where....