Vacation Three Days In

I lay face down in the sand, soaking up the sun, tapping my toes to the beat of the music from my ipod. I am finally in a state of complete relaxation; I am almost in a dead sleep. And then I hear a calling in the background. Someone is calling my name and I think, damn it, I was so wanting to go to sleep! I slowly turn my head; I’m now facing the sun. The brightness of the sun turns my vision completely white and it’s as if I have died and I’m looking at the light in front of the tunnel.  After a few seconds, a black blurry object shades my eyes from the light.
       “Tessa, Tessa, Tessa” the voice calls.
The blurry object shakes my shoulder frantically, desperately trying to get my attention. I make an annoyed sort of grunting sound and push the blurry thing off of me.
       “Tessa, help, something’s happened to Dad!”
At that second I realize that my younger brother is not just trying to annoy me the way he usually does. I take a quick look down the beach to see what my brother could be getting so worked up about. Right where the water crashes down on the shore I see a herd of people surrounding something. Without thinking I sprint down the beach pushing people aside screaming, “That’s my Dad!”
As I reach the inner circle of people I can see two men dragging my Dad’s body up the beach, letting the crashing of the waves scoop him up and slide him farther from the water. I push through the last set of people in front of me and sit about two feet from my father’s motionless body. That’s my dad. It’s my dad who is lying there. It’s my dad who isn’t breathing. It’s my dad who could be dead.
       The tide keeps crashing right on top of my dads face, making it near impossible for him to breathe, that is if he is breathing. He is still not moving. One of the men who pulled my dad out of the water begins CPR. I watch with both amazement and fear as my sight gets fogged from my tears. I think to myself How could this really be happening? There is no way in hell that this could be real right now!
       As my brother and I sit there crying, staring at our father’s body, another man asks us where our mom is. I go blank for a second. Mom…what mom…oh our mom…where could she be...I’ve got it! My mind is racing with 23984750123 different thoughts and then I yell out, “She’s in the bathroom.” Because I am crying so much my speech is slurred and filled with gaps when I gasp for air between my sobbing and speaking. A middle-aged woman comes up to me saying, “Come on dear, I’ll help you find your mother.” I jog to the hotel bathroom with this woman following quickly behind. I swing open the door that says “Women” and I find my mom standing with her back to me, hunched over, applying sunscreen to her legs.
       I cry out “Mom!”
My mom quickly whips around and her face turns from a normal stare to a worried and scared one.
       “Honey, what is it?”
       “…its dad…something’s happened to dad!”
Before I am able to finish my sentence, my mom darts out of the bathroom, nearly knocking over the women who escorted me, and heads toward the beach. It takes me a second to realize that my mom has left and that I should head back down the beach.
       Once I get to the beach about seven people have already called for an ambulance. My mom is standing near my father’s body with a handful of people coming up to her, telling their interpretation of what happened to my dad.  I overhear the CPR man say
“It’s very important that we don’t move this man too much because it could create more damage.”
The man was still giving my father CPR. I could tell it was difficult for the man to make any progress because water was still slipping through my father’s lips, filling my dad’s mouth with ocean water and sand. My brother and I, along with a couple other beach goers, grab some boogie boards and try to create a barrier against the waves. Because my brother and I are fairly short, we get pushed aside while others take our place. Tons of elderly women and mothers start to hover over my sobbing brother and me as we stand there helpless and scared. Finally my dad is breathing again. The man who gave him CPR is able to get a limited amount of information out of dad before the real help arrives. I have never been happier to hear my dad’s voice. I can faintly hear my Dad say:
       “My neck…I think my neck is broken and I can’t move the rest of my body”
       Within five minutes the ambulance arrives. Two men and a woman run out of the back of the vehicle, dressed in dark blue uniform button up shirt and shorts. The crowd starts to back off making room for the paramedics and their equipment. After talking to the CPR man and my dad, the three medics’ dash to the back of their car, pull out a stretcher and maneuver my dad on to the device and carry him into the back of the vehicle. The driver informs my mom
“Excuse me miss, but we can only allow one person inside to ride in the ambulance.”
“Well I can’t leave my children” says my mom
A nearby police officer says
“Uh, miss, well if we just calm down a minute I can give you directions to the hospital.”
My mom tries to interrupt every once in a while and I can sense the anger rising in my mom’s voice as the police officer takes his time to explain how to get to the hospital. It takes the small, plump officer about twenty minutes to give my mom directions. In the mean time, my brother, Sando and I are still a mess and it’s probable that my mom is doing worse.

This vacation was supposed to be an escape from reality, an escape from work and school and all the family drama. This vacation was supposed to bring our family closer again, join my parents and make them forget about the possibility of getting separated. This annual trip to Maui was supposed to be the treatment my family needed to be happy again. But reality only became that more real through this Hawaiian vacation.

As the conversation between the officer and my mom comes to an end, a couple approaches us with great news. Karen, a short, petite, curly haired woman and her tall, droopy faced husband, Scott, offer to escort us to the hospital. My mom quickly accepts the offer, grabs our beach equipment, and drags us to the car. We pile into our car, nerves still shaken as we follow a pale blue van 45 minutes to the other side of the island  where the one and only hospital lies. There were so many emotions traveling through that car ride. The three of us were not sure how to react to each other. It was fear, confusion, shock, thankfulness and disbelief all mixed together to create a mega emotion that the three of us shared.

Of course my brother and I had lots of bothersome questions.
“Mom, where are we going?”
“Mom, is Dad going to be okay?”
“Shhh…I really need you two to be quiet until we get to the hospital…Oh crap was I supposed to turn there…Oh shit where is that couples van!”
We navigate through the traffic on the highway and find the van that we are supposed to be following. We finally arrive in a more residential part of the island and there lies the big cement hospital buildings. My mom zips through the parking lot and sprints out of the car to the waiting room. My brother, the nice couple and I followed behind. My mom has already gone in to the emergency room where they are holding my Dad. I see him for the first time since we left the beach. He is just how I left him-- motionless, speechless, and almost lifeless. The doctors had to cut my Dad out of his bathing suit, a process which pours about half of the beaches’ sand onto the clean, polished floors. My dad skin tone was near ghostly white, his lips dry and chapped, and his hair looked like it just went through a blender. I can’t be in that room any longer, not while he still looked like that. I push back through the double doors into the waiting area. The room is cold and uncomfortable. I realize this is my first time being in the emergency room of a hospital and of all places it had to be on my vacation in Hawaii. I sit in the hard plastic chairs as I wait for my mom and brother to finish talking to the doctor.
“The doctors said that Dad has broken three of the vertebrae in his neck and with more tests they will be able to find out if anything else is damaged” says my mom in a slightly shaky voice. “Apparently Dad was able to tell the paramedics that he hurt his neck by diving into a wave and hitting his head on the bottom of a sand bank.”
The second my mom says that I imagined so clearly my dad doing his classic little sideways squiggle dive into  the arch of the oceans’ waves. As a kid, he would spend his entire summer on an island in Italy. I have heard millions of stories about him and water. The ocean has been such a big part of his life, especially as a kid, and through that he made the ocean a big part of my life. Dad was the one who taught us how to swim when we were little and encouraged me to keep up with it over the years. Much of our relationship has revolved around our love for the water and water sports. As far as I know, this thing that has brought us closer as father and daughter could change our relationship for the worse. The one thing we have a common passion for has nearly killed my father and I fear how it will affect our already rocky relationship.

By now it’s about 5 in the evening and we are all regretting having skipped lunch. My mom gives Karen and Scott an update on the situation with my Dad. My mom tries to figure out how she is going to take care of my brother and me and be here for my Dad. The couple graciously offers to take Sando and me out to their favorite pizza place back on the other side of the island. My mom hesitates to accept their offer; after all, we have only known these people for about an hour and the idea of something possibly happening to my brother and I (on top of what has happened to my Dad) was definitely not something my mom could handle. After a few minutes of contemplating, Mom decided it would okay for Sando and I to go out to dinner with Scott and Karen. My mom gives Karen a business card with directions to our hotel on the back and as soon as we got a change of clothes out of the trunk, we were off to BJ’s pizzeria.
Sando and I climb into the middle seats of their light blue mini van. I catch a glimpse of my reflection in the window; my face is red and splotchy and my eyes are still puffy from crying. My mind was so caught up in all these different thoughts and emotions that it made the forty five minute car ride back to Lahaina seem less than a minute long. We drive down the city’s main strip and luckily find parking right away. As the four of us walk down the street to the restaurant, I wonder how this meal will go. Is it going to be awkward because we’re dining with total strangers or will the conversation come easy and we’ll all get along great? I look out onto the water and then back at my brother and can’t be happier that I’m not an only child and have a sibling to be with me in times like theses. Even if we don’t talk about everything that’s going on, it is comforting to know that I’m not going through this alone. My nerves are calm as we walk up the stairs into the restaurant’s main floor. Loud upbeat jazz overwhelms my ears and the smell of fresh pizza dough and tomatoes reminds my stomach of how hungry I really am. Our server seats us at a table in the middle section of the room, right against the balcony. Sando and I quickly decide on a pizza and get our orders out to the server as soon as she returns with our waters. The four of us exchange the typical questions that you ask when you first meet someone one like “what grade are you in” and “what’s your favorite class” or “do you guys play any sports.”
After we got the filler stuff out of the way, Karen says
“You know we were supposed to be leaving today to go back home to Arizona, but when we woke up this morning it didn’t feel right to leave just yet. We called the travel agency to see if we could rebook our tickets for the end of the week and since they said it would be no problem we knew there was a reason we were supposed to stay. The second I woke up this morning, it was like God or something had come into my dreams and told me that we were gonna be needed on this island for a couple more days.”
Initially, I was at a loss for words because of the story. I soon bring myself to say
“I can’t thank you enough for listening to your gut and staying in Maui because you guys have been such a help during this chaotic time.”
I feel like my thanks is cheesy and could never compare to what this couple has done to help my family in probably the hardest afternoon of our lives. They were God’s little angels that were supposed to be watching over my family and today they used their magic to save my father from death.
We finish our much-desired pizzas and Karen offers dessert.
“Have you guys ever tried a pazzokie?” Scotts asks, his voice rises with a little excitement at the end of his sentence.
“Nope, what is it?” my brother questions with great curiosity.
“It’s a cookie baked in a small pizza pan with a dollop of vanilla ice cream, drizzled in caramel and chocolate sauce. Would you guys like to try one?”
“YES!” Sando and I cry out in unison.
The wonderful pazzokie arrives at our table; steam still bubbling off of the perfectly baked dough and the sauces mix with the melting ice cream to create a creamy sort of concoction. This was the ideal end to a delicious dinner that helped my brother and I escape from the harsh reality of what has recently happened to my dad.
We walk back down the busy street, shops on one side and a multicolored sunset reflecting off the water on the other. As we make our way back to the car, I start to feel like I’ve gotten too old to live in Never Never Land because I now have to face the harsh consequences of reality concerning my dad’s physical health. Once again fear and sorrow fill my body, I start to choke up with what feels like a huge ball rolls into my throat. I try not to think about whether my Dad will recover from what ever it is that could be damaged and I really try not to think about how this will affect my family, specifically my parent’s marriage. I realize how hard this is going to be for my mom and right then I promise to myself that I will do my best to keep from making things any harder. Thankfully Scott and Karen were already doing their best to keep things easy for my mom. They were so nice to take care of my brother and me and they were so comforting that I never wanted this evening to end. Though it may seem mean and selfish, I didn’t want to go back to the hotel or to the hospital because then this tragic accident would have to be real. I climbed back into the blue mini van and do my best to direct us back to the hotel.
We finally arrive at Kahana Falls Resort. The sky is a deep purple and the air is warm and cozy. Scott pulls into the driveway at the front of the hotel and we all get out to say our goodbyes.
“It was so nice to meet you two and I really enjoyed our little dinner” Karen says in her sweet, high pitched voice.
“Yeah, I had a good time with you guys tonight. I hope everything goes well with your dad and let us know what you have planned for tomorrow. Maybe we can all go to the beach.”
“That would be really nice, I’ll be sure to have my mom give you a call tomorrow. Thanks again for dinner; we really appreciate your kindness and generosity.”

The rest of our vacation consisted of going from the hospital to the beach back to the hospital and then to the hotel for dinner and a good nights sleep. Sando and I spent most of our beach time with the supervision of Scott and Karen, at least until they left two days later. My mom did her best to juggle taking care of my Dad and giving Sando and I the type of vacation that we all hoped for. As for my Dad, no surgery could be done while in Maui. The doctors were able to keep him in a stable state while in the hospital with the help of a temporary neck brace. Aside from being extremely bored and having to spend his Hawaiian vacation staring out of a window over looking a beige cement building, my Dad was fine.
This whole experience was so surreal and unexpected. Even though what happened to my Dad was tragic, it seemed like this vacation was filled with miracle after miracle. My dad surviving was a miracle. My dad surviving with the only side affect being a sore shoulder was a miracle. Lastly Scott and Karen were a miracle. It was God’s calling to have them stay an extra day and be there to watch over my family. I don’t think I have ever been more touched by a stranger’s kindness than I have been by Scott and Karen. They that left a lasting impression on me and through Scott and Karen I have learned how to truly appreciate the good things that life brings.