2.30 Manoa Valley

Bobby and Claudia, Oahu

1957 – 1958 • Honolulu, Hawaii ~ Mom and I settled in upper Manoa Valley, a trolley ride from Honolulu. A valley with a higher elevation than sun-drenched Waikiki, it squatted at the foot of a tropical rainforest shrouded in low rain clouds. When they passed, brilliant rainbows broke through, topping the lush mountains softly draped in emerald velvet. Manoa was populated with old colonial homes completely hidden behind six-foot privacy hedges on paved winding roads. We lived on a dead-end street in a small, one-bedroom, add-on apartment. You could barely find our place hidden behind the giant tree ferns, flowering plumeria, and peeling bamboo stands. Scarlet Hibiscus blossoms spilled over the fence, and there were stiff Birds of Paradise that poked straight up, holding sentry, their orange faces and violet beaks vigilantly looking this way and that. It looked like a jungle.

Mom, Bobby and me in Hawaii, Jan 1958

My memories of our nine months in Hawaii are in slow motion. They were a long nine months. I remember the beach and going to the Bishop Museum with my mother, Bobby, and Claudia. I remember what happened with me and Bobby. And I remember being back in the hospital again, having a tray with warm 7-Up, red JELL-O, and a small bowl of poi—a mashed goo with the texture and taste of fermented wallpaper paste.

Cathy, June 11, 1958, King Kamehameha Day

I remember the long, blue-flowered muumuu Mom made me. I remember making leis from the two tall plumerias in our yard dripping with fragrant yellow and white blossoms. I remember the King Kamehameha parade and taking pictures of the huge floats.

Cathy and Mom, Hawaii, June 1958

I remember Claudia shooting this photo of Mom and me, taken with my Kodak Brownie camera, a present from Daddy for my eighth birthday. It’s the only photo I have of just the two of us. Standing, my hand is resting on Mom’s shoulder; she is down on one knee, her right arm wound around my bent lower leg, both of us turned slightly toward each other, looking into the camera. I study this black and white for some sign my mother liked me; it seems she does in this picture. She so seldom touched me, or maybe that is the one thing I just don’t remember.

to be continued…

© 2018. Catherine Sevenau.
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