Big Round Silvery Moon Orb

We knew it was coming, Moorea's modest lagoon tides were unusually
low, hidden chunks of coral reef were exposed, little sand islands
popped up, the beach was slightly bigger. The night before was cloudy
so you couldn't see much of the big white ball, although it did make
the dogs howl and cats jump around. Tonight it was completely clear,
full of the brightest big stars while waiting for the moon to peek up
over the rugged ridge of the jagged little green mountains that make
this island (we look at these, we never climb in them). When the moon
did rise above the ridge it was huge, much too big, how could we make
it through a clear night with that hanging over us. My only thought
was that it was doing the same thing over other places I knew and
people I love, my family and friends, dealing with this same big white
thing many thousands of miles to the north and east or west of us.

Here it is almost like daytime it is so bright and easy to see, the
trees provide shade and the white coral beach looks completely normal,
just a little bluish. Off in the distance the waves keep breaking on
the barrier reef, you can hear that drone of the surf twenty-four
hours a day. In the water tropical fish are swimming around just like
in the day. Down along the shore there are lights from the Tiki
resorts (whose drumming and dancing shows we occasionally hear while
we linger on our deck) with moon lit silhouettes of palm trees doing
their leaning over the water thing. A couple of gringo boats, one
trimaran, one catamaran, bob around at anchor just off of our beach.
Claude and I swam out to them earlier today and got the low down on
this one guy's trip; our age, single or whatever, from Texas, been
bumming on this beater trimaran since 1999, eats well, takes it easy,
does some charter, knew the people on the other boat from the
Marquises and Ecuador, picks up and drops of chicks on occasion, so he
says (his beer belly wasn't commenting).

All of the little bungalows here are lit up with this sunny moon with
our building project standing out as the break through design idea.
Our shed thing, that everyone else has, is now cleanly attached to an
"outdoor" kitchen, separated by a five foot wide breezeway which leads
to the new deck where we sit to watch the sun or moon rise, facing the
field of Tahitian flower bushes. One thing that was on the to-do list
that got done, only took twice as long as we thought, was ripping out
the poo poo brown wood grid and opaque fiberglass window in front of
the big shower stall and replacing it with sixty glass bricks, six of
them turquoise blue made in Italy, the rest bubble pattern French.
The moon shone on this, with all of its meticulous grouting work and
trim, the big ugly pile of dirt and rocks from the gray water tanks
put in the ground were also cleared and a happy little winding path
sculpted in its place. These Society Islands are one unusual society,
that all zaps me when I see things like the bright white zinc oxide
coated nipples of the bare breasted, well bounced-up, tanned and
stacked French woman lying there in the white coral sand, dark brown
skin with two funny looking jumping full moons with volcanoes sticking
up resting calmly there in the gentle warm breeze.

In fact the moon makes it so much like day I think I'll go down to the
beach right now and test the water. After making a last minute wine
run before the store in the village closed and a check in with
tiki.net where I got to chat with Sophia again, Claude and I had a
dinner of boiled potatoes with olive oil while we watched a cheesy
Catherine Deneuve movie (she's in her 20's), fortunately my eyes
crashed down and I keeled over and landed on my floor mattress for a
good nap. Barbara also conked out quite early after a day of glass
brick grouting, we'll all probably be up around 5:30 or so waiting for
the sun to peek over the jagged ridge and the Tahitian ladies picking
blossoms at the palm bordered flower plantation to begin another day
of pulling this remodel together with a mixture of American, French,
and Tahitian guys smoothly doing their thing.