Page 2 - MidWeek Kauai - April 13, 2022

2 KAUA‘I MIDWEEK APRIL 13, 2022
Threads Drawn From The Heart
To work with love ... is to weave the cloth with threads drawn from your
RIf You Build It ...
An early visit to the grocery store, the center of town life, garnered a guarded reception from the lady who ran it — and the realization that I’d have to prove myself. Perhaps with music and art, we could build connections.
With the growth of mutual appreciation, our lives became interwoven and remained so even after that seasonal job ended. Today, the drawings threaded into the fabrics of my aloha clothing business still feel like a continuation of the inspiration found long ago in the flora, the fauna and the hearts of Kalaupapa.
David Shepard, a horticul- turist-turned-designer, works his illustrations of native plants into Hawaiian clothing to raise awareness of, and encourage funding for, local conservation. Visit davidshepardhawaii.com.
Chasing The Light is pro- duced by Robin Stephens Rohr and Lynne Johnson.
ay Kinsella heard the call: “If you build it, they will come.” That was 33 years ago in the movie Field of Dreams. Ray, of course, was a fictional character,
but the concept lives on. The question in Hawai‘i has al- ways been what is “it”? We’ve been talking about building something economically viable here to help keep our keiki home, to retain our incredible culture and character without relying so much on the tourism industry alone. We’ve heard a lot of talk, but little investment or capital put forth in real- izing our field of dreams. Cybersecurity? Alternative, clean or renewable energy? Defense initiatives? A mini-Silicon Valley or a tech hub with remote work encouraged? Medi- cal research? Ecotourism? Rocket farm? Innovative kūpuna care? Perhaps dozens of smaller but potentially lucrative and alluring opportunities that add up, rather than pegging our hopes on just a few ideas.
tion: 86. Median age: 57.
In a first glimpse of the is- land through the prop plane window, impassable sea cliffs appeared to seal off a pictur- esque town set on a small re- mote peninsula. Its harsh time- less beauty would at first seem to be matched in character by its inhabitants: caretakers and a handful of cured leprosy pa- tients living out their lives far from the bustle of life. Most unexpected was the loneli- ness. Once on the ground and surrounded by three suitcases of belongings — heavy with
Slowly, the individuals around me emerged in their humanity: the Catholic sisters who played mahjong, the car- penters who drank ‘awa after work, the nurse who fed stray cats, the patient who stopped by the nursery to talk about plants. Weekends were soon spent drawing native plants with the town archivist. Then the grocery store auntie invited me to play piano for a commu- nity concert. After I accompa- nied a nurse who sang Ave Maria, a patient, almost blind,
The Census Bureau reminds us of our ongoing streak of losing residents annually — down 12,337 from July 2020 to July 2021. That makes five straight years of population de- cline. Hunches suggest that in-migration includes wealthier second homeowners and immigrant service industry work- ers, while out-migration includes those who want a starter home and a sustainable career, or older folks who’ve simply decided that the price of paradise is too tough to handle.
Gheart. — Kahlil Gibran raduation day from
wai‘i at Mānoa left me burned out — from arduous study, from working three jobs, from sleep deprivation. Yearn- ing for a slower pace, I jumped at a seasonal job offer to run a native plant nursery. Location: Kalaupapa, Moloka‘i. Popula-
a large drawing book and full- sized keyboard — I felt sealed off from all those around me.
clasped my hand and, through tears, quietly affirmed, “Maha- lo. You belong here.”
the University of Ha-
with David Shepard
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Post-COVID, economic recovery here may quicken as visitor floodgates reopen and tourism increases. Suggested, sensible usage restrictions and user fees may help the state/ city coffers without seeing visitor numbers rebound to new records. But even with an expected, long-overdue minimum wage increase, how to thrive here and plan one’s future real- istically makes our now-annual population decreases a rele- vant concern. We need the best and the brightest, from within and without, to hui. We need local stakeholders, passionate empaths and interested investors to get actively involved in realistic, yet far-reaching, proactive economic planning.
If we extrapolate this annual trickle of people leaving Hawai‘i over the next 20 years, it portends a diminished labor force not offset by a retiring, elderly population with age-related needs. It’s time to get serious. This conundrum has been tossed around like a barbecue burger for decades, with little emphasis given to solutions. Entrepreneurs, re- alists, problem-solvers, culture advocates, philanthropists, educators, gerontologists, astronomers ... we’ll need a big room, big thinking and big action plans. Who’s ready to dream and build?
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