Hawaiian stars

Coincidence level: 3/10 Category: Funny / charming / cute

On New Year’s Eve, on the beach on the west side of Maui, near Lahaina, I ditched plans to go surfing and instead posted up and read a book and chatted with a stranger for a few hours watching the sun set.

“I saw a shooting star,” my beach companion said to me after as we gazed up at palm tree silhouettes and what seemed to be as many stars as I’d ever seen all together, littered across the most gorgeously clear night sky.

“Really?” I exclaimed, delighted but also a tiny bit incredulous. “Are you sure it wasn’t a plane?”

“Yes,” she said. “I just saw another one.”

“I’m jealous,” I said, having never seen one before. “Is it common to see them here?”

“Yes.”

A few moments passed and then:

“Oh I saw one too!” I said.

“Are you sure it wasn’t a plane?” she teased.

The rest of that night was like a dream — a group of friends, bonfires on the beach, Latin music, Swedes and Argentinians and Germans and Californians abundant. Strangers and lonely souls and those seeking warmth, myself included.

Rituals and baby fireworks and still I couldn’t rip my eyes away from looking at that clear night sky, the most beautiful, surreal sky I’d ever seen.

New Year’s kisses followed by private talks under palms and intimate moments in hammocks. Exactly as you would’ve imagined it in your dreams — that was my night.

Three weeks later, in New York, right before I hopped on a plane to Toronto (literally right before the airport), I went into a local tattoo parlor. No appointment, hoped there was a tattoo artist available for a walk in. And there was.

“I’m getting this tattoo of a shooting star for the first one I saw in Hawaii,” I said. It was to live on the curve of my palm.

“Oh,” the front desk girl said, “Eli is actually from Hawaii. That’s so akismet.”

“Oh really?” I said, “you’re from Hawaii? That’s so cool, yeah I heard it’s pretty common to see shooting stars there?”

“Yeah,” Eli responded, “the sky is super clear because the islands are so far from any pollution. It’s why they set up so many telescopes there.”

. . .