Hale Kilinahe: The Journal

DECEMBER 10, 1997 I finally sought the help I need today. I have this stubborn pride that refuses to allow me to usually seek it, but I'm realizing that this is about way more than just my pride. I went on WIC today. Here in Hawaii, government assistance is no big deal, really; in fact, there was this whole big discussion about us in the news during that whole welfare-reform debate. It's the cost of living here, but that's another entry entirely. I'm just not making enough at my job right now; so I'm going to accept this help until Ryan gets a full-time job. He's just applied for the public information office job at UH. I hope to God he gets it. I dread becoming a statistic. When I get scared about having this baby, this is what scares me. Just the simple inability to do what others do seemingly with little effort. My parents made it okay without any help; so did Ryan's parents, so why can't I? Could we really manage better in another part of the country? Meanwhile, I worry about Ryan. I love him so much, and we're getting along so well, that it would just figure that he gets bored with me or frustrated at fatherhood. He keeps a journal too, and upon his request I read his entries as he finishes them. Tonight as I read his latest, I read about his impending "midlife crisis." I didn't know he felt that way. Well, I did, but he never really tells me when he's feeling pensive, so even when it's written all over his face it's hard to know what is going on in his head. He loves me; he wants to take care of me and this family and sometimes he's even more eager than me, and no woman can be more lucky than that. It makes me so happy to know that even after the regrettable mistakes I made, he thinks I'm the cat's pajamas. But I look at his parents, and other busted-up couples and I know that realistically, that could be me. His mother makes faces whenever his dad is around and I'm sure she loved him, too. The way we are now is just so perfect, so ideal, that I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop, I guess. A pessimist to the end. His life as we knew it is pretty much over. He can't just take up projects on a whim anymore and that must scare him to death. We get the second sonogram on December 30. We'll finally find out what it is. I wish we could have found out sooner. It doesn't do us much good now. Warning: here begins another rant. Topic: the sorry state of country music these days. All the men wear big hats and all the songs sound the same. There's fifty million acts and not one of them has anything that distinguishes them from the rest, except for Leann Rimes, whose talent is being wasted on crappy material. There's one video on CMT's high rotation by another young girl who looks like two-thirds of my high school and the lyrics are straight outta eighth-grade creative writing class. It's because country is so popular that it's over-saturated with good-looking people performing mediocre, over-produced drivel with no soul. Country was derived from the blues, but you could never tell these days. And I won't even begin with Shania Twain. < BACK | TOP | NEXT >