Hang Loose

Another thing about Hawaii: it changes you while you’re there. This lush colorful world around you is so laid-back and easy, your internal clock settles down to this island groove. There’s nothing around you to complain about, and if you did find something to complain about, people would look at you funny - look up at that beautiful sky, those beautiful mountains, that beautiful ocean – just hang loose, brah. I’m generally not into fruity rum drinks, back in Boston I drink a lot of gin, a lot of scotch, I want a cocktail with some bite, some backbone. In Hawaii I look around at paradise and I think: “I’ll have another Mai Tai.”

And I understand how, after a point, you’ve got to get off that damn island. There’s no edge, people aren’t striving to excel, to find the next new thing, to make things happen. Pax Industria tells me the music scene out there is a couple years behind Boston, and I wonder how many great musicians, artists, writers, creators, entrepreneurs have come from Hawaii? You don't hear the phrase "Precision Hawaiian Engineering". Why is it that, for people to produce works of genius, they have to live in a place where at least one season out of the year is trying to kill you? Pax’s mom was a school principal and she said it’s a serious problem getting kids motivated, because they’re all kicking back in paradise. I know I’d be skipping class to go surfing.