A Place to Call Home

When I was a kid, I always imagined what my life would be like outside of Hawaii.  As far as I was concerned, I had been born onto a tiny rock in the middle of an ocean and there was a wide, wide world out there just waiting for me to set sail.  As a teenager, I counted the days until my chance came and, when college rolled around, I was gone.

I think it took me until I left Hawaii to realize just how much a part of me that place is.  So much of who I am (almost everything, really) is a direct result of those islands, those people, that history.  I'm fairly certain everyone can say that about their home as well.  

As the years passed though, and I continued to live elsewhere, my connection to Hawaii became a little more frayed.  Yes, I've gone home to visit on average at least twice a year, and yes I still go by my Hawaiian name no matter where I'm living.  But unless I concentrate on it, I don't generally speak with my childhood accent, and unless I've recently returned from a long day at the beach (and where are there any good beaches here anyway?) my skin is shades lighter than it "should" be.  In Hawaii these two things are the initial markers of a local so, without them, I'm often mistaken as a tourist.  It's actually been pretty jarring to be with my older sister or my dad and to be confused as the haole (i.e. non-local) cousin from the mainland.

I think it's caused a bit of an identity crisis for me if I'm perfectly honest.  Particularly compounded with all the cultural identity stuff you're taught as a Native Hawaiian kid going to a Native Hawaiian school and learning about not only your historical connection to the land, but your responsibility to it and its people as well.

And maybe that's why it was really difficult for me to make the decision to give up my Hawaii residency.  I think I was worried that it would sever this already really tenuous tie I have to that place and my life there, my family.  It would make what those people are saying true; I really would become the haole from the mainland.

In the end though, I guess I just realized that what I check on a box for tuition purposes means very little when it comes down to it.  The fact is that I don't live in Hawaii right now, and yes, as a result my skin is lighter and my accent is softer.  Does that make it any less my home?  Does that make me any less Native Hawaiian?  Not at all.  In fact, I think I've gained a little bit of a sense of independence and freedom from all of this that can only help me to become a fuller, more well-rounded person as a whole so that, when I finally do go back (and I will), I'll know myself that much more.

It's sort of like a kid taking the training wheels off their bike for the first time.  It's scary, but it's the only way you'll ever learn to balance.