Snow Angel, Sand Angel Flashcards
The whole class will make dioramas about the season they pick out of her straw beach hat.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“Don’t let me get winter,” I say to myself.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
I reach in and spin the papers around: winter.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
Dried branches for dormant trees
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
And white glitter to sprinkle on cotton-ball bald spots.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
My father helps me finish mine.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“Migration,” I write.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
They come home.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“In the wintertime, the golden plover comes home to our backyard.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
He’s skinny and hungry from flying three thousand miles nonstop from Alaska!
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
I put my golden plover in the middle of the field.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
But this all makes me sad.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
My eyes grow big with excitement.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“It’s three days old,” my father sighs.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
The storm came on Wednesday night.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“Don’t run around too much on the summit or you’ll get dizzy,” my father reminds me.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“We’re nearly inside the heavens.”
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“There’s a lot less oxygen up here, so you better take it easy.”
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“Oh cripes,” I tell him, out of breath, and so dizzy I think I’ll be sick.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“Protect your hands, so you don’t get frostbite.”
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
Someday, I won’t have to wear my father’s old socks, loose and wet, over my cold hands.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“This is all we’ve got.”
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“Cheer up!” my mother calls to us as she tries to snap some pictures.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“No way!” I yell back.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“I’ve got two tiny lava rocks for the eyes,” he says placing them in the melting mound.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“And I found this mamane branch for his pipe,” my father says.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
My mother puts an ume where his nose would be.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“I made this pickled plum from our own tree.”
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
They stand back and admire the lumps of ice.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
He places his ugly hunting cap on the stunted lump.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“Native Hawaiians know the names of a hundred winds and all of the oceans’ currents,” my father tells me.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“The stars, too.”
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
Each and every beautiful star.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
I don’t say anything.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
I will grow wings and fly away, rise up from the highest mountain and take myself to another place, more beautiful and special than this island, the only place my father and his father before him have ever known.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
The only place I know.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
My father takes us to Hapuna Beach the day before the New Year.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“The beach is always right in your backyard,” he says to me as he opens the car door to the smell of kiawe trees and ocean mist.”
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
He starts with his own ball of wet sand.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
He covers this with fine, dry sand, then wet sand again, then dry sand.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“And here’s some driftwood for his pipe.”
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“A smooth pebble for his nose,” offers my mother.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
I begin gathering tiny pieces of white honeycomb coral.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
My mother finds seaweed for his long hair of many colors.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
I drag the sugarcane truck inner tube to the water.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
My mother tells us the name of the creatures.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
Hinalea, beautiful green wrasse.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
Manin, striped convict tang.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
Lauhau, golden butterflyfish.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
Humuhumunukunukuapua’a, painted triggerfish.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
She shows us the rise and fall of honu’s tiny head and the glide of his shiny turtle shell.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
My father names the hundred winds that carry the fragrance of these waters to us near the far reef.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
I run up and down the sloping shore, the waves catching my only when I get tired.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
At the beach, I never feel dizzy or out of breath.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“Watch.”
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
I lie down next to him.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
“You can grow wings in this place,” he says, “this very beautiful place that we know so well.”
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
But I am not sad.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
The setting sun is a volcanic orange sphere hovering above the horizon.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel
Climate zones are the weather patterns and temperatures of an area.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel - Author’s Note
From the time I was a little girl, I learned so much about endangered plants and animals, all living things, and life-giving materials like water, dirt, stones, and sand found nowhere else in the world.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel - Author’s Note
Sometimes we think we are more powerful than the plants, insects, animals, rivers, rocks, sand, moss, and trees that have been here for millions of years, but really, we are equal in the eyes of God.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel - Author’s Note
In fact, scientists call my home the Endangered Species Capital of the World.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel - Author’s Note
It will allow scientists from many nations to study the evolution of our universe and even explore thousands of galaxies beyond our own.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel - Author’s Note
The kia’i want to do what is right for Mother Earth - to protect her and honor her.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel - Author’s Note
Many indigenous peoples, like our kia’a, struggle for rights to safeguard their sacred lands.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel - Author’s Note
My hope remains for you to respect and take care of the sacred living and life-giving gifts where you live.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel - Author’s Note
Then you, like me, can tell your children, and their children, about your courage in protecting the place you called home.
Snow Angel, Sand Angel - Author’s Note
An explosion of lava from volcano crater? A stretch of beach with white, black or even green crystals of sand?
Snow Angel, Sand Angel - Author’s note
