Born in Haena-
I was born on the North Shore of Kauai in the 1970s a little pocket of paradise called Haena a place where the mountains rise like the ancient garden guardians and the ocean breathes in and out like a living heartbeat. My earliest memories are woven with the sound of the rain on tin roofs, the scent of plumeria drifting through open windows and the steady rhythm of the waves rolling onto the reef. Growing up there felt like being raised inside a storybook written by nature itself. Our community was small safe and tight-nit, the kind of place where every adult knew your name. Every kid was your cousin or your friend and every day held some new adventure waiting just beyond the ironwood trees. We spent our childhood barefoot, the earth was our playground. Cold Mountain streams, where we learned to swim before we could spell our names, endless beaches where we built forts from driftwood and chased the tides. Lush valleys where we picked guava until our fingers were sticky and sweet. There was no rush, no noise, no hurry just a slow steady rhythm of island life. Our parents were the heart of it all, gentle grounded and full of love, they taught us to respect the land to listen to the ocean to greet our neighbors with aloha and to always leave a place better than we found it. They gave us freedom but also roots, they gave us safety but also wonder. They gave us a childhood that felt like sunlight. Nights in haena were their own kind of magic. The sky was so dark you could see every star and the trade winds carried the sound of the ocean, straight into our dreams, we’d fall asleep to the chorus of the ocean waves, the rustle of palm fronds and the soft laughter of our parents talking story on the lanai. Growing up on the North Shore in the 1970s wasn’t just a childhood. It was a blessing a rare golden slice of life for nature raised us as much as our parents did. Where community meant family, and where every day felt like it belonged to the island and to us. Even now no matter how far I travel or how much the world changes a part of me is still there, barefoot in Haena, running along the sand carried by the wind and the waves of home. Blessed.
