Ohana and Hanai

For Seda

In Hawaiian, there are two kinds of family.

Ohana is biological family.

Hanai signifies adopted family members, or more precisely people placed in your care.

And we can be placed in the care of others.

I think of Ohana as the room you are born into,

Hanai consists of beautiful things that present themselves to adorn the room.

Ohana is biology.  Hanai is a gift from God, fate, or the universe—

Wherever you may wish to attribute it.

The two together are necessary for a life of love.

Sometimes they overlap—I have ohana nieces and nephews I love like my children,’

Which makes them hanai,

I have hanai sons and daughters, brothers and sisters—

All of whom are the found diamonds that adorn my life.

We make friendships that come and go.

We know of “friends for a season, friends for a reason.”

They come and go with the passage of time.

But hanai endure, sometimes through a lifetime.

If you think of our path through life as a brick walkway,

There are bricks that do not endure, but crack and break

Through many cycles of heat and cold.

Others are worn from the passage of many feet.

But certain others remain whole and,

With very little imagination on a sunny day,

One can see them as guideposts for our steps.

They are like the little blossoms poking through the snow,

Reminding you that spring exists.

That is what hanai is.

They are an essential part of that crew of our passage.

They help to guide us, but also walk with us.

To navigate   together   through the seas of life

Calm or Stormy

And they are there when we comes to port for the last time.