Sacrifice...

This past Sunday, I was in Hilo with my son Elliott as he was with his hālau hula practicing for the upcoming Merrie Monarch Festival in the actual venue they will be performing in. I was actually exhausted from just watching how hard the dancers worked over and over through their routines and movements. The Kumu guiding and adjusting here and there. Humbly grateful to be present to bear witness. 

During a break, I needed to drive about 30 miles up to Volcano and then back down to Hilo before practice ended and most of us needed to get to the airport to return to O'ahu. I made the trip up the hill in record time, took care of my responsibilities, then headed back down the two-lane highway back to Hilo.

On the way down, about half way along the route, I saw movement up ahead in the roadway in the opposite lane. As I approached, I saw a tragic scene. 

A black chicken, a hen, was frantically darting in and out of the roadway as cars zoomed past. I could see two baby chicks running around her erratically in the road, as oncoming cars zoomed passed and even over them. The chicks were actually blown around by the draft of the speeding cars, knocked down, and then scrambling to get back up to chase their mother, as my own car approached quickly in the opposite lane. 

It was then that I saw another lifeless form of black feathers on the roadway. As I passed, I saw that another chick had already been hit by a car and was crushed and somewhat flattened. My heart sunk so quickly as more cars continued to speed by. 

My mind raced as to what I could do to help. I glanced in my rear view mirror as I passed to make sure that everything I saw was real and not imagined. To my horror, I saw another car which had just passed me, run over a second chick. It was a horrific vision.

I panicked at that point. I knew that as long as the dead smashed chicks were in the road, the mother hen would be trying to protect them, to resurrect them, risking her life and the one remaining chick. 

I had always remembered, many years ago, seeing a Beautiful red-headed cardinal dead in the roadway by our old office and her partner flying frantically back and forth to her lifeless body and a nearby tree. As I walked by, I picked up the dead bird by her feet and put her next to the curb so she wouldn't get run over again and so her grieving partner wouldn't risk getting struck by a car either.

Sadly, on my way walking back from my meeting, I passed the scene again by our office. Her partner laid dead in the roadway while she was still next to the curb. I felt so horrible. Like I should have done more.

Back to the present moment of the chickens, I immediately started slowing down, and somehow having ended up with a huge white Chevrolet Suburban as my rental car, it took some length of highway to bring that monster to a stop on the side of the road. I watched the cars speeding by in both lanes and made my illegal U-Turn. I stomped on the gas pedal and shot back up the highway as fast as I could. 

I scanned the road for the scene as I didn't remember exactly where they were as the bushes and foliage on both sides of the road was really uniform with no distinguishable markers. 

I then saw the mother hen, in the distance, in the roadway in front of me and the two lifeless crushed bodies of her chicks in my lane. As I quickly arrived closer to the macabre scene, it was then that I saw the body of the third chick, in the opposite lane. Crushed and smeared across the lane.

There are no words to describe how devastated I felt. As my vehicle slowed down, with cars on my tail, all I could think of was how I failed in my mission. All three chicks dead now.

My only hope now was in trying to save the mother hen at that point. My whole Heart had already sunk so deep within my chest that pulling it back out seemed impossible. But I thought about saving the mother again. I quickly pulled my monstrous SUV onto the narrow shoulder of the road where the mother hen was darting in and out of the traffic.

As soon as I stepped out of the car, the mother hen ran into the bushes behind my car. I got out and looked at the bodies of the three chicks in the roadway. All I could see was feathers. Blood smeared. Stomach contents spread out. Little legs mangled. Eviscerated. Such a horrific scene.

The mother hen came out of the bushes, looked at me, and started to make her way towards her three chicks. Just then a massive truck sped dangerously close by both of us and actually shook the Suburban. A chill ran up my spine as I thought I could easily get hit by a car on that narrow shoulder. 

But I knew that I needed to retrieve the three bodies and get them off of the road so the mother hen wouldn't keep entering the highway as she would surely die any moment now. I had to summon the courage because I was honestly frightened of dying.

I remembered that for some strange reason,  while in Volcano, I had put a Ziploc plastic bag into my trunk for no apparent reason. I opened the back hatch and quickly grabbed the bag, sticking my hand into it like a crude glove.

For a brief moment, I thought to myself, what the hell am I doing. Millions of chickens die each day. I myself have consumed countless original recipe and extra-crispy birds without any aforethought, or afterthought for that matter. 

As cars continued to speed by dangerously close, I really thought that I might get hit and die trying to save a chicken in the road. I quickly put all those fears and thoughts out of my head and focused again on my task at that point. 

I turned, and when there was enough of a break in the onslaught of cars, I darted out into roadway and grabbed the feet of the first bird, and ran back to the side of the road and placed her on the grass next to where I last saw the mother hen. My heart was racing and I was already out of breath.

I then turned, and after a few cars passed, ran back out to retrieve the second bird and brought her back to the site of the first lifeless body. I heard the mother hen clucking away in the bushes next to me but couldn't see her.

The third chick was in the far lane and it was a little more dangerous to run over and pick him up as the field of view of cars zooming down on the other side of the highway, at 60 to 70 miles an hour didn't give me much time to move.

I ran as fast as this old beat up body could move when it was clear and picked up the last chick then ran to that side of the shoulder until a few cars sped past me. I felt the wind of their wake again as my heart pounded even more from the adrenalin.

I could see the mother hen out of the bushes and walking around her two chicks as I darted across the two lanes again. She ran back into the bushes. I laid the third chick down with his siblings.

I had to really get back to Hilo by then. So I said a little prayer, assessed the situation quickly as having done everything I really could do at that point, and climbed back into my car. The air-conditioning and cushioning seat were a welcome reprieve from the sweltering vigorous activity I had just engaged in. 

Right before I decided to make a U-Turn to head back in the opposite direction, I happened to notice a little clearing right next to where I had pulled over about nine-years earlier. It was a tiny little verdant grassy area. And it was the exact spot where a Beautiful gifted friend of mine and I had pulled over,  and into, when she came to visit me to help me figure out this special pōhaku that my father had found. 

My mother had just passed and it was only then that I was able to remove the stone from the house as it was somehow helping to keep her alive for several years. When I removed the stone from her hospice bed, she passed within 15-minutes. I needed to know the mo'olelo, the story, of the pōhaku. The first picture my father ever took of the stone showed a human eye in the empty socket of the stone's face. I knew there was a Spirit in there.

My gifted friend had received instructions, via visions and 'ike pāpā lua, that she needed to make a special pū'olo for an offering, an 'ālana, to akua Pele at Halema'uma'u, and Kanaloa, before she engaged the stone and tried to get his name and mo'olelo.  She was worried that we were in Pele's domain already and halfway to Halema'uma'u and Kīlauea so wanted me to pull over right away to put her Kī leaf pū'olo together with 'ōlena, pa'akai, 'uala and other contents requested by akua Pele as dictated by her Spirit Guides. That is a whole other story however.

That I recognized this exact spot again, in the 30 mile expanse of that Highway 11, was nothing short of amazing as I momentarily relived the connection of the stone to Kamehameha Pai'ea. We had just spent the morning at Laupāhoehoe where the hālau danced a hula in their repertoire to honor Kamehameha. 

The wahi kupuna at Laupāhoehoe was a very special area. Ki'i of two very powerful deities of Kameha'ikana and Kihawahine were found there in the 1880s. Powerful Divine female akua. Kihawahine having been an instrumental akua in Pai'ea's strategy to unite the warring separate island chiefdoms.

It was also a place of sacrifice. The 1946 tsunami, on April Fool's Day, killed 159 people, including 21 schoolchildren and 3 teachers right there at Lapāhoehoe Point where our huaka'i led us that Sunday morning. There was actually a memorial service occurring that same morning that the hālau visited to connect to their hula and the 'aumakua there.

It was a powerful journey there and somber as well. A powerful synergy between the Memorial Services that were occurring and the seemingly unrelated hula visit. It was not serendipity however. Divine Guidance. Life. Death. Reflection. Remembrance. Honoring. So many young people taken. So many grieving parents. Grieving mothers. 

That Kanaloa's power consumed that place didn't escape me either at that moment of looking upon this familiar verdant clearing on the side of the highway. Mōhai. Sacrifice. Pele. Kamehameha Pai'ea. Black baby chickens. Like the pua'a hiwahiwa. The black sacrificial pigs. 

I quickly brought myself back into my current situation, and when I could safely do so, I punched the accelerator and did another illegal U-Turn and pulled quickly over to the side of the opposite side of the road, and parked on the shoulder. 

I rolled down my window and watched the area where the three dead chicks now lay, and I did a final reflection on all that had just occurred. Giving thanks that I was still alive and not run over like the three chicks. 

I saw the mother hen emerge again and walk around the three chicks, while strutting, clucking and looking over across the highway towards me. Then repeating her grieving process over and over. I thought to myself, that she may be able to reproduce again and bring new Life into the World. At least she was alive.

Deep down, however, I knew that I was just trying to make myself feel better for having totally failed to act fast enough to save the chicks. 

As I stared across the highway, in a reflective daze, lost in thought, I was transported right back to reality and the present moment by the loud chirping sound of a baby chick. I couldn't believe my ears. 

I strained to see across the two lanes and watched the mother hen clucking and walking around in circles around her dead chicks. I actually thought I was hallucinating in my guilt by hearing the chirps of ghost chicks.

Then there she was. A fourth chick emerged from the bushes. Chirping away. Joining her mother. The two of them walked around the three bodies of their 'ohana. 

My Heart raced again as adrenalin filled my veins. I realized that the fourth chick had hid in the bushes and thankfully, despite the tragedy, her mother was still alive. Her mother still had her. The two of them had each other. 

I pulled out my camera and snapped a photo of the mother hen as we looked at other for what seemed like an eternity. It was probably really only five-seconds or so. 

I was so happy as my eyes filled with tears. The risks had all been very much worth it. I truly savored that momentary joy amidst the tragedy and horror.

After savoring the scene for awhile more, I started to pull into the highway as the mother hen and her remaining chick went back into the bushes. 

It was then that I glanced up through the windshield and was astonished to see a large Hawaiian Hawk, an 'Io, soar right above my car and circle quickly around the death scene, as she herself soared across the road and into a forested oblivion.

It was such a humbling and powerful hō'ailona. A sign. From the Ancestors. That all was as should be. The actions and reactions. The Love and the Loss. The Saving and the Sacrifice. She herself could have swooped down and quickly grabbed the remaining chick or even her mother with her sharpened lethal talons. But there had been enough death that day.

I was also reminded that in our culture, the moa, or chicken, was an 'aumakua to some families, an ancestral guardian, as well as referred to at times as an "ali'i" or chief, in some mo'olelo, stories and wise sayings.

Humbly Grateful for such experiences, connections and powerful affirming lessons for my Soul, and as I write this out to help me reflect upon the details, the lessons and process the trauma to Heal.

And the answer to the age-old question of why did the chicken cross the road was finally answered, at least for me, after half a lifetime of wondering. 

She crossed the road, to sacrifice herself for her children. 

Thank you to my own Beloved Mother for all of your Sacrifices...

Thank you Divine Female Universe...