On the first day of school, I distribute 3x5 cards to the students and have them complete an "information card" for me. Mostly these cards provide me quick and easy access to their birthdays and some trivia that I use as a base for becoming better acquainted with each of them. On the lined side of the card we establish the basics: full name, preferred name, birthday, where the house is located (as in "on base" or town/neighborhood), siblings, and pets. On the back side of the card we do a quick graphic organizer thing by dividing it into four sections and labeling each one with these: likes, dislikes, skills, hopes and dreams. I complete my card on the board as students do theirs. Since my middle school teacher beginning, I have always written "live by the sea" as one of the items in my "hopes and dreams" section. This year when I wrote in that phrase, one of my students offered, "Ms. Cahoon, here in Okinawa you could really do that--live by the sea." And now I do. I actually live across the street from the sea...the Pacific Ocean, to be exact. And everyday I am mesmerized all over again with the play of light and shadow of sea and sky. In counterpoint, harmony, or unison--their ever-changing renditions carry me into an elsewhere of beauty and possibility. Considered sub-tropical, Okinawa has coral reefs and seas arrayed in tropical blues and greens--seas where colors like aqua, cerulean, celadon, turquoise, cobalt, and teal were born and raised. Sometimes these dazzle and dance with almost blinding brilliance, and sometimes they mingle and marry in a watercolor wash, muted yet memorable. At night, though,the sea is wrinkled black, but, at moments, points of light might bounce and skeeter across its rumpled surface. Since I live on the Pacific side of the island--the east side--sunrise may actually unveil the sun in its morning color and light show although it is not a given. Sunset, too, often presents a color and light show as well but always sans the sun. Here, then, are shades of sea and sky as viewed from my balcony:
Travel isn't always pretty. It isn't always comfortable. Sometimes it hurts; it even breaks your heart. But that's okay The journey changes you--it should change you. It leaves marks on your memory, on your consciousness, on your heart, and on your body. You take something with you. . . . Hopefully, you leave something good behind.
--Anthony Bourdain
Rambles by the Sulu Sea
Lankayan, Malaysia (Borneo)
Rambles in Springtime
Newgrange, Ireland
Rambles at the Pier
Mamanuca Islands, Fiji
The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only one page. --St. Augustine
You go away for a long time and return a different person--you never come all the way back.
--Paul Theroux, Dark Star Safari
Rambles while Running
Near Sajima Bay, Japan
Rambles Down Under at the Top of the North
Cape Reinga, New Zealand
Rambles through Doors
Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA
Rambles in the Snow
Seoul, Korea
Rambles with Ladies on Floating Islands
The Uros on Lake Titticaca
Rambles in a Place of Buddha
Hong Kong, China
Rambles among Ruins
Pisac, Peru
Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people will not feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.... And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.
--Marianne Williamson
Rambles in Godzone
90-Mile Beach, New Zealand
Rambles with a Window View
Blarney Castle, Ireland
He did not think of himself as a tourist; he was a traveler. The difference is partly one of time, he would explain. Whereas the tourist generally hurries back home at the end of a few weeks or months, the traveler, belonging no more to one place than to the next, moves slowly, over periods of years, from one part of the earth to the another.
--Paul Bowles, The Sheltering Sky
Rambles with Geishas
Kyoto, Japan
Rambles at Sunset
Mt. Fuji from Ashina's Beach
Rambles in the Neighborhood
Galle Fort, Sri Lanka
Rambles below Windows
Cusco, Peru
Rambles at the End of the World
World's End, Horton's Plains, Sri Lanka
Rambles in Bamboo
Yokohama, Japan
Poetry is to prose as dancing is to walking. --John Wain
