May 28th

Monday, May 28th, 2018

I am in a beautiful place with this crazy amazing guy. I mean, this is the stuff of dreams.

Last night we stumbled across a beach that is within walking distance of our AirBNB. We went for a walk around the neighborhood, and there it was: A little walkway between two properties that snaked its way down to the ocean.

We had run out of daylight by that point, so we didn’t stay long, but we made plans to come back this morning.

Before we came to Hawaii, I knew I wanted to carve out time to take a good picture of Paul and I on the beach. With my “new” camera (coming up on having it for a year already!), I can turn on the built in WiFi and trigger remote from an app on my phone.  Hence why I’ve been trying to do more self portraits this year.

So Paul and I planned to get up early this morning to be the first people on the beach to set up my tripod and take pictures of the two of us.

He’s such a good sport.

It was so beautiful. Storms were slowly moving in from one direction, so there was this ominous feeling of rain. And in the other, the clouds were colorful because of the sunrise.

On the gorgeous north shore with the waves rolling in and the ocean breeze teasing my wispy hair.

With this man who will always hold my heart.

I will treasure the pictures we took forever.

We checked out of our North Shore AirBNB later this morning, and moved our circus down to Honolulu this afternoon.

From a shack with and outdoor shower to a condo on the 27th floor with views of the ocean.

We walked down to Ala Moana Beach, and it was a mad house. We thought it was just because of Memorial Day today (Pearl Harbor is next door), but it turned out to be an annual Lantern Floating ceremony.

Thousands of people on the beach. THOUSANDS. (Note: I looked into it now that we’re home and 50,000 people were on the beach!)

But when the lanterns went out, it was beautiful. So many people remembering loved ones. They had big screens showing people as they let their lanterns go in the water, and this sweet little boy, who looked to be about 8 or 9 pushed his out with tears streaming down his little face as he turned into his mom’s arms as they sobbed together.

My eyes were dry until that point.

It made me really stop and think about all of the stories standing on that beach at that moment. Thousands of people, each thinking of people who influenced their life. People they miss. What are their stories? Who are they? Was this little boy missing his dad? How has that changed his relationship with his mom? It made me want to hug strangers.

So as the day comes to a close, I find myself very fortunate that I had taken these pictures with Paul this morning. A celebration of life and love, a moment frozen in time of thankfulness.