Incident at Spouting Horn

Today I returned to my beloved Kauai, my favorite of the island chain.  Kauai is beautiful, green, lush and uninhabited by tourists.  There isn’t much in the way of shopping or tourists attractions on Kauai.  The attractions are natural: the Waimea Canyon, the Na Pali Coast, the Wailua River and they are all stunners. 

 

As I drove along the highway, I rolled my window down and reminisced about my birthday weekend I spent here last year.  En route to a sunrise biking tour down the Waimea Canyon, I had called and asked for directions to the site.  The stoner/tour guide extraordinaire had said to me: “whatcha need to do is get on a road that looks big enough to be a highway, roll down the window, and stick your hand out. When it gets cold, that means you're getting toward the ocean and you're close."  At the time, I was being my typical Type A personality and was annoyed by this lack of direction or landmark (and also convinced there was a man with a hook for a hand in my backseat.  Did I mention it was five in the morning and Kauai is a desolate place?)  Now, a year older and wiser, I rolled the window down, stuck my hand out, and enjoyed the ride.

(And maybe I took a picture while driving since I was the only person on the road for miles)

 I thought a lot about last year’s trip.  One of the highlights had certainly been that bike tour led by two absolutely endearing and baked out of their ever-loving mind stoners.  I remembered in particular a turn of phrase one of them had used to describe a particular heinous act of eco-irresponsibility: F-ing Motherf-ing Pigf---ing Pigf---er. 

You see?  There really isn’t an obscene phrase out there that gets it better than that.  Use it in a sentence.

Now, in between this reminiscing and the blog incident I’m about to detail, I did two things.  I hiked some falls which weren’t technically open to the public because of some mud slides in the area and all I got for my trouble were dry falls, red mud on my socks and some heightened heart racing (I was so certain that I would get caught and get in trouble).  The second thing I did was stop at the western-most McDonalds in the U.S. and pick up two apple pies.  Why, you ask, did I drive 20 minutes of my way to do this?  If you had to ask that question, then we’re not friends.  You know why I did it.  Because I’m a damn glutton and those are the best apple pies ANYWHERE because they still use the deep fryer from the sixties which has now gone out of vogue because of the war on transfats.  Fat kids are ruining everything.  

(Western most McDonalds, if you look closely, you can see a McNugget on the loose)

Now on to what shall be known as the Incident at Spouting Horn. 

Spouting Horn is a big blowhole.  I decided to stop here to break up the drive back to Kapa’a.  You drive to it, you get out of your car, walk to the fence, watch it spout water, and then get back in your car and check it off the list of things to do in Kauai.  Ideally, you do not step on wild chickens while you are at it.  They are everywhere and nest in the park up near Spouting Horn.  And it happens to be baby chick season.  

Now, I got out at Spouting Horn and the blow hole was really giving the crowd of people off a tour bus a show.  I took out my camera, lined up the shot, and inadvertently nudged the brim of Sox cap up.  Because it was February in Kauai, the trade winds were blowing like crazy, and a gust of wind carried my hat over the edge of Spouting Horn and down onto the rocks.

The guy next to me, who was wearing an “old guys rule” t-shirt, a wide-brimmed visor, and socks pulled up to his knees (just like my Dad wears them), turned to me and said, “that’s a real shame.”

I fixed him with a plain look.  Hemorrhoids are a real shame.  Fanny packs are a real shame.  Socks pulled up to your knees are a real shame.  This was a nuclear holocaust.

I’ve had that Sox hat for almost 15 years old now and it still remains the coolest gift my brother has ever given me.  I suspect it is now part of my DNA and that in the future when they start cloning me (and let’s be serious, who wouldn’t want  little snark armies of me running around) I will come cloned with the Sox hat already on my head.

My hat predates the 2004 and 2007 victories, which means, I had that hat when it actually meant something to be a Sox fan.  That hat has seen the likes of Nomar, Trot Nixon, and Troy O’Leary.  I was wearing it when they lost in the play offs in 1999.  I was wearing it when Aaron f**king Boone hit the home run in 2003.  And I was wearing it in 2004 when Keith Foulke flipped the ball to Doug Mientkiewicz and again in 2007 when Pap struck that guy out (why can I never remember his name) for the final out. 

And, I wore that hat to my LSATs and during my first year final exams, both semesters.  It hiked Mount Rainier, Diamond Head, Kahtadin and the craters at Volcano National Park with me.  I finished my first book in that hat and I was wearing it the day I found out I got into law school (true story).  And I would have worn it to the bar exam if the board of bar examiners had let us.  But you better believe that it was a constant fixture on my person during those wretched months of studying.    

To shamelessly plunder one of the quality war movies out there:

“This is my [Sox hat]. There are many others like it, but this one is mine. My [Sox hat] is my best friend. It is my life.”

It wasn’t a question of whether I would try and retrieve it, it was a question of how.

Immediately, I went around to where the fence ended and there was a sign posted that read: “KEEP OUT DANGER BEYOND THIS POINT.  FOR YOUR SAFETY THIS AREA IS CLOSED.  MAXIMUM FINE OF NOT MORE THAN $100.”

 (Note, but no jail time.  This might have changed the equation.  Maybe.  Probably not.)

Now, I looked at the opening of the fence, the jagged rocks, the sheer drop off into the water below and I asked myself two questions.  Actually, the first thing I did was to ask the woman hawking jewelry if rangers and cops patrolled this area.  She said of course not, the rangers never came around this way. 

And then I asked myself two questions.

1. If she were mistaken, was my hat worth a $100 to me? Yes.  Zero hesitation. 

2. Given the rocky topography, vertical drop off, and general klutziness of my own nature, was I willing to bleed for this hat?  Yes.  In for a penny, in for a pound.

I don’t want to make a mountain out of a molehill here.  It’s not like I was scaling the Cliffs of Despair Princess Bride style, okay?  They weren’t THAT sheer and I wasn’t wearing a mask.  But they weren’t exactly a place I’d pick to tromp around.  So I scaled down around the edge of the fence and slid a few times on the rocks and the dirt.  Once, I really almost fell (on rocks, not down into the water or anything) and I caught myself with my hand on a rather sharp rock and I let loose that perfect obscenity: F-ing Motherf-ing Pigf---ing Pigf---er. It felt great, actually.  I’m dusting that expression off and going to circulate it around more.  And then I scraped the back of my legs on some bramble and since apparently I’m allergic to bramble, those scratched swelled up something fierce and itchy.  But I didn’t plummet to my death, break an ankle, or bite it in a major way.   

I did, however, attract a rather unhelpful audience who kept yelling at me from above and behind the fence that I was not supposed to be down there.  Yes, I had gathered that, mahalo.  And some of them took pictures of me.  Hopefully, they caught me from the right, that’s my better side.  A few actual helpful people helped navigate me to where the hat lay, easier spotted from above than where I was.  It was perched precariously on a rock, swaying back and forth as if it might blow off any minute in the ocean.  I was within four feet of my hat when I heard a loud, authoritative voice: “You are trespassing in an unauthorized area.  Get out of there immediately.” 

That’s what he said, but what I really heard was, “there goes your law license, I’m going to haul you off to a federal prison for people who trespass in our national parks.  And I’m going to call your mother, tell her what a complete dumbass you are.  And then I’m gonna take your hat and throw it back over the edge.”

So I did what any prudent person would do.  I pretended I couldn’t hear him and retrieved my hat.  I jammed it back down firmly over my head and thought, now don’t you ever scare me like that again.

Then it was time to face the music. 

I’m gonna call the Parks and Recreation guy Ranger Rick (in honor of the magazine of our childhoods).  Ranger Rick was one of those gorgeously tanned Hawaiian guys with dark eyes, dark hair, and a perfectly toned physique.  I feel ugly just being within 3 feet of him and more so because he was furious with me.

“What’s the matter with you?  You not see the sign?  You can’t go down there, it’s dangerous.  (Something, something, something about what an idiot I was), I’m going to write you a ticket.”

Now, I wholeheartedly believe that all tickets are discretionary and issued at the will of the officer/ranger/authority figure in charge.  I came to conclusion this after four years at Colby College where I received 7 written warnings from local law enforcement and staties for violating the rules of the road.  To this day, I’ve never actually received a ticket or citation of any kind.  So I believed that all tickets were negotiable until written.

When it comes to ticket disputes, I think people can be divided into two basic categories.  The first contains those people who just want to stick it to the Man.  They will get up in the cop/ranger/authority figure’s face and rant and rave about power trips and the unfairness of the law or whatever makes them feel good.  In the end, they’ve stood up for themselves, but they still have a ticket to pay.

My brother is one of these people.  I’m not.

I fall squarely into the category of people who believe that I am the exception to whatever ticket is being issued and I will do my best to make the cop/ranger/authority figure see this from my perspective.  Given my illustrious record of zero speeding and traffic violation citations issued, I’d say I have a pretty good handle on this.

And yes, as my best friend, Big once pointed out, I have two, uh, assets located between my chin and navel.  All girls have them, and apparently, these have magic powers that get girls whatever they want.  So if you want to explain it away that way (because you’re a guy and you’re bitter), you go right ahead.  This isn’t why I have the knack for getting out of tickets.  It’s a whole lot simpler than that.

I like people.  A lot.  I like watching them, talking to them, and in particular, listening to them tell their stories and experiences.  When it comes down to it, I’m all snark and no bite.  Being snarky takes efforts.  Smiling and conversing with random strangers doesn’t.  Why be miserable when you can be nice?  (Note: this doesn’t mean if some jerkwad is hitting on you or someone picks a fight with you that you have to be nice.  I’m certainly not above bringing the wrath of snark then).  But just in general, you never know if you’re going to go out and get hit by a bus.  So you may as well be nice to people.  

So the way I see it, talking your way out of a ticket is really just forging a connection with someone so that that person would feel bad actually giving you a ticket.  Spin doctor, I know.  But even if you fail, you still get a good story out of it.  And besides, I told you I thought my hat was worth a$100 to me.  I was ready to pay that price for it, but not without a fight.

So Ranger Rick and I started the “getting to know you dance.”  He got to lead since he has the uniform and one of those old school ticket pads out already (you know the one with the pink slip, yellow slip, and carbon copy).  Now, I knew coming out swinging was no way to handle this, it was better to let Ranger Rick lecture me on why it was dangerous to disobey those signs.  And he made good points.  This poor guy had to deal with countless morons who routinely ignore those signs to get a better picture angle or lose stuff over the edge, and let’s face it, I was one of them.  If I had fallen and gotten cut up or broke my neck, then I’d really have made a mess of things for Ranger Rick, so he was in the right to berate me.

So at first I said, “I wouldn’t have done it under any other circumstance.  This hat is over a decade old.  I was wearing it when the Red Sox won the World Series.  Sox fans, we’re just nuts.”  I was testing the waters to see if he was a baseball fan.  He wasn’t.  Ranger Rick remained impassive.

What we had here was a failure to communicate.

That’s okay.  I’d had plenty of training for this sort of thing.  Like everyone else, I’ve been on some absolutely awful dates where it seems like every other word out of your date’s mouth (or your own) is a conversation killer.  Here’s my best one (and no, this was not a first date, I was at a keg party on campus), guy I know says to me: “I love your hair.”  I responded politely and said thank you.  But he didn’t stop there.  “It’s so beautiful that I want to cut it off while you’re sleeping and make a braid of it so I can always keep it with me.”  YUP.  That was actually said to me by a classmate of mine in my sophomore year creative writing class and he was also a fellow RA with me, CREEPER.  So yes, like everyone else, I’ve had practice with conversation killers.  Explaining the sentimental value and sports significance of the hat got me nowhere with Ranger Rick.

So I tried again from another angle.  “My kid brother gave me this hat,” I added, “and it’s the one thing in the whole world that keeps me from being homesick when I’m away from home.”  This got me a little nod from Ranger Rick. 

I just assumed I was getting a ticket now.  But, I thought I’d give it one more try.  And in a moment of pure full circle-ness, It was the stoners from my bike ride who saved me.  Those wonderful F-ing Motherf-ing Pigf---ing Pigf---ers.  What happened was, a tradewind blew across me as I was talking to Ranger Rick, and I shivered a little and zipped my Sam Adams track jacket up. 

Me: “Sorry, I love Kauai, but man, those tradewinds.”

Ranger Rick: “You’ve been to our island before?”

Me: “Oh yes, I came out here last year by myself for my birthday.  Then I came back with my parents and here I am again.  It’s my favorite island.”  (Ranger Rick is now smiling slightly.  This is a good sign.  So I push on).  It’s such a drastic change from Oahu.  I love Waikiki, but it’s very touristy and the whole city caters to it.  What I love about Kauai is that everyone here works really hard to keep the island the way it is.  I mean, yes you guys have tourism, but it’s all eco-friendly.  You teach people about the island without exploiting it.  I think that’s incredibly responsible.”  (Okay, maybe I wasn’t quite this eloquent, but it was close and this was the gist of my message).  And yes, I really was laying it on this thick.  When you are trying to beat a ticket, you have no dignity.  You check it at the door.  That’s the rule.

Ranger Rick: “We do try to preserve the natural surroundings that have been entrusted to us.”

Okay, that’s not a slam dunk, but I sense he’s warming to me now.

Me: “When I came out here last year, I went on a tour of Waimea Canyon, a bike tour.  It was amazing, but the tourguides (and I leave out the pertinent details about them being total stoners who literally would smoke any plant on the island) told me some really troubling things (and here I was really reaching), something about how you guys blocked the ferry from making a permanent stop here?”  In chess, we call this a gambit.  We want the other person to take it, but it’s uncertain if they will go for it.  I didn’t know where Ranger Rick stood on the ferry issue, maybe he thought it was a great idea, but I didn’t think so.

Ranger Rick launches into a five minute description about how he went door to door and personally collected signatures (from little old ladies who I’m sure were grateful to have a strapping young ranger at their doors). 

And then I went in for the kill (thank you, stoners).  I said, “that’s so incredibly responsible of you.  It’s really a shame when people in your position abuse it.  I read about the reef bleaching incident with your head warden.”

Reef bleaching, the process of pulling your boat up a living reef, dumping a diluted bleach solution powerful enough to stun the fish so that they can be collected for tropical aquariums.  As you can imagine, this would be like gargling with bleach, it’s bad juju.  It kills the reef.

Game.  Set.  Match. 

Ranger Rick and I discuss the deleterious effects of reef bleaching (which, I’ve just told you my entire knowledge bank on the subject, so I let Ranger Rick really go off here).

There is absolutely zero chance that he writes me a ticket now.  You see?  I've made a connection with Ranger Rick.  We've had a good conversation, I'm not getting a ticket, and I've learned a whole lot more about reef bleaching.  Everybody's a winner.

But here’s where I almost became the world’s biggest loser.  This is akin to pushing all in on a pair of tens when there’s a jack on the flop.  You go for it, but you don’t feel good about it, because let’s face it, Big Samarel is probably playing AJ.  Jerkface.

“Will you take my picture?” I ask Ranger Rick.  “I just want to be able to tell my Dad and brother what I went through to save my hat.”  That and it will mean more to me personally if you take the picture, because I can snark all over the place about it later in my blog.

Ranger Rick eyes me carefully.  “You want me to take a picture of you?”  He gives me what might be considered a disapproving glance.

“Please?  I just want to remember this as the day I almost lost my hat.”  And talked my way out of a state park ticket by waxing poetic on reef bleaching.  Reef bleaching.

He puts away the ticket pad slowly and carefully, comes over and takes my picture.  I’m not stupid enough to ask to take one with him, this isn’t Nam.  There are rules.  Ranger Rick reads me the riot act once more about not violating the rules of state parks (the really, really funny part about this is, it’s the second time I’ve done it THAT day, since I’d already gone and hiked the falls that were closed down).  Ho hum, ho hum.  I promise to be a little goober, Ranger Rick.   

 

 We headed off, just me and my beloved hat.  I decided to stop at the Pearl Shack, a notorious tourist trap (one of the few on the whole island) and took turns with a pair of Japanese tourists doing some super corny poses (seen here and here's a fun fact, the female tourist helped pose me by yelling 'stick your butt out'), just me and my hat (my hat did not stick its butt out, obviously.  It stuck its brim out).

 

(Baby, I'm your Pearl)