don't forget to smile

"Isn't this place wonderful?" Jacek said,
nodding towards the sunset unfolding before us on another day in Kanaha
I'm ashamed to admit that I hadn't noticed
my mind had been preoccupied with technical aspects of how to nail a
trick I'd been working on for years,
"I kinda prefer Barbados..."
My mind still reeling of how the conditions weren't quite right,
or how I'd set up my sail wrong and how I should fix it tomorrow

Somewhere along the drive home,
with the sun lazily coloring the sky a cast of muted pinks to my left,
A neighbor stopping to say hi to me in the grocery store,
and a myriad of stars above me my head as I took my shower to candle light,
I knew I had to eat my words back.

For all the roaches I had to kill every other night,
And the moments when I was gripped by anxiety over how expensive living here was...
If Jacek who bore a fitting profile for the locally despised Haole windsurfer could recognize its imperfections and still embrace it as wonderful and as home
Then I could embrace it too
because nothing is perfect
nor is it ever meant to be

This isn't Barbados
and this isn't San Francisco
but it is simply and wonderfully,
Maui