That One Time That I Made Contact with Lava

Everything memorable that ever happened to me happened when I was seven. As unbelievable as that sounds, somehow it is true. The list of things that happened when I was seven could fill a composition notebook. Most likely, everything I remember happening when I was seven happened at other times of my hazy childhood, but I like to think that they did not; it was just one very eventful year.

One of the most memorable experiences that occurred in my seventh summer was our family trip to Hawaii. My parents usually planned a yearly trip to amazing places: Alaska, Italy, Scotland and Ireland, a three-week car trip around the Western and Midwestern United States...

This may not be our exact route, but it seemed like it. 

On this trip, we flew to Hawaii, boarded a cruise ship, and proceeded to journey purposefully around the many islands. On one island, we had the magnificent opportunity to walk on an old, solidified lava flow.

 

The starkly black, extremely hard rock stretched for, what seemed to my small mind, miles. Surrounded by the ocean on virtually all sides, the lava flow was, in a strange way, beautiful. My older sister and I decided to each take a souvenir from this excursion. We both picked up one black lava rock each. As is my general habit, I lost my rock on the bus ride from the flow back to the pier. As the bus driver directed us through the island, I could hear my rock sliding back and forth on the bus's floor, but, luckily for me, I couldn't see it. My sister, in her fashion, looked after her rock, and managed to hold onto it until we reached the ship. We decided not to tell anyone about our rock thievery. 

Once we were back on board, my sister started to feel very sick. She was nauseous, her head hurt, her stomach hurt. She looked terrible and felt worse. After a few hours, the story of our lava rocks got out. Soon, one of the stewards on board came to us, and told us that my sister was sick because she had stolen a lava rock and taken it from its home. The volcano goddess, Pele, was angry, and she was punishing my sister because she had stolen from her.

Pele...What a witch. 

To appease the angry goddess, the steward (a very versatile man) acted as a sort of shaman and conducted a ceremony. Words were chanted, something was burned, and the rock was thrown into the sea. Immediately, my sister felt better. Weird, huh?

After this frightful episode (which has rather less to do with lava than the title of this post would imply), I made contact (albeit distant) with lava for the first (and only) time. Later that night, when we were all asleep, the ship's fog horn started blaring. Everyone, except for me, rushed to look out of the window. My parents had to forcibly shake me awake, as I have, to this day, a penchant for sleeping through chaotic experiences. The cruise passengers hurried to the deck just in time to see, barely fifty feet from the boat, streams of lava flowing into the sea from the nearby volcano...that was ERUPTING (ok yeah, erupting is a strong word for this slow descent into the water but still...) Enormous clouds of steam wafted from the sea, and I could imagine it screaming in pain and abject horror as this disgusting substance violated it. 

Horrifying. 

And that's the story of the time I nearly made distant contact with lava. But it must be remembered that I could have died from Pele's rotten curse if I hadn't lost my rock. Also, that lava could have jumped into the boat...it's very sinister. 

Moral of the story? Always lose things you weren't supposed to have in the first place.

Second possible moral...always keep shamans on hand.