Poor Olivia. She's so attuned to shifts in our schedule. Is this because we're very close since I was home all or most of the time for her first three years of life?

I've been working a lot for the past few months. Early mornings, late nights, weekends. I'm not sure why it's so busy. Maybe the economy is picking up so more people can travel or book events.

Claus is a super dedicated dad, but she is a Mommy's Girl.

Apparently, she tells the teacher every day "I want my mommy." She revealed this to me yesterday.

"Every day?" I asked in amazement? She used to do this in preschool, too.

"Yes. Or sometimes I want to say it to her but I can't," she said.

Aww. So young and tender and attached. I felt bad.

I clarified with the teacher that it's only cropped up lately. I pieced together that it's coincided with my very busy work period.

That's the working mother's guilt. There will be periods of work like this. There will be guilt trips like this.

Should I address this with Olivia or should I do something extra-nice for her this weekend?

When Susan Koki walked into a King Street watering hole last April to pick up her son, she never expected she would find the love of her life. "I had been a single mother since 1995, and I was content. I wasn't looking for a man, and I was prepared to spend the rest of my life this way," she recalls.

She met up with her son, Dillon, who said he wanted to introduce her to his favorite bartender, Danny Higa. "Something clicked. It was the sparkle in his eye, and his engaging smile," said Koki.

Photo courtesy: Susan Koki

It was instantaneous for him, too. The chemistry was intense and fast-acting. "I knew quickly this was someone special," said Higa.

It was mid-April. The two started going out. "By the end of April, I knew this was the man I wanted to marry," Koki said.

Photo courtesy: Susan Koki

Then, she says, destiny stepped in. On the evening of May 4, the two met for a date. Koki was running late, and when she arrived, Higa told her he had a chest cold, was tired, and was going to go home. "My car was blocked in, so I needed to wait for her to come and drive me home," he recalled.

Koki said he looked terrible, but Higa insisted he was fine and wanted to go to sleep. When he jumped in her car, Koki drove him to the emergency room. "She told me I could get mad at her tomorrow if it's just a little chest cold, but I was going to see a doctor tonight," said Higa.

Koki's instincts proved right. Immediately, a nurse noticed Higa's hands had turned blue. He was taken right away into ICU for what became a ten day stay.

Higa had serious heart problems, and the medical team needed to induce a coma. He had a 20 percent chance of survival. "It was so serious, my family was called in to say goodbye. My son even flew in from the mainland," explained Higa.

"Talk about crash course in meeting the whole family," Koki jokes now. At the time, though, it was overwhelming for her - and ironic that two people who were not even looking for love, found it, only to possibly have it torn away all too soon. "How can this be?" she remembers thinking. "I just met my soulmate!"

When it came time for Koki and Higa to say goodbye, "I just kept saying sorry," he said. "I never thought I would be at death's door."

For ten days, she kept vigil at his side, talking to him, telling him of all the things they have yet to do together. When he woke up, the first words he said to her were, "I love you. I can’t live without you.  Marry me now!"

Koki said no. She knew she wanted to be his wife, but not under these rushed circumstances. So they planned a date for the one year anniversary of his hospitalization.

The two are flying to Big Sur, California, to be wed in a small, intimate ceremony in front of family and a few close friends on May 4.

Photo courtesy: Susan Koki

"It's only fitting," explained Higa. "It's not the day my life almost ended. It's the day it began, with the revelation that it was the start of something great with Susan."

New Film on Hawai‘i Explorer- Botanist Joseph Rock (1884-1962): A Founder in Island Natural History and Yunnan China Culture Studies

‘Ahahui Mälama I Ka Lökahi, Sierra Club's Oahu Group and University of Hawaii - Windward will screen a recent 52-minute film on the life of Joseph Rock, the "Father of Hawaiian botany", who went on to become internationally recognized for his explorations in China. The free film showing of A King in China: The Life of Joseph Francis Rock will be introduced by several heirs of the Pohaku legacy on Friday, April 26, at 6:00 p.m. inWindward Community College Akoakoa 103. These will include Sam 'Ohukani'ōhi'a Gon & Steven Lee Montgomery. Producer Paul Harris of "People and Places" will send a message from Europe.

The 2013 showing coincides with the 100th anniversary of a foundational book on Hawaiian plant life, Rock’s 1913 The Indigenous Trees of the Hawaiian Islands, republished by National Tropical Botanical Garden (NTBG) in 1974. A largely self-taught scholar and explorer, Rock has many Hawaiian species named for him, including endemic lobelias and asters. His other books covered sandalwoods, ornamentals and leguminous trees, plus complete reviews of loulu palms, öhi’a lehua, lobeliads and tree cottons.

In the 1920s, Rock traveled to Southeast Asia for the U.S.Department of Agriculture to collect plants used in treating Hansen’s disease. He is most known for expeditions led for the National Geographic Society and Harvard in Chinese and Tibetan border regions, documenting Natural History, then culture and language of the Naxi people in Yunnan province. He continued work in Asia into the 1950, and then back to Hawai‘i, where he died in 1962.

National Tropical Botanical Garden Director Chipper Wichman says, “The story of Rock’s explorations in China is so fantastic it is hard to comprehend in the context of our modern society. Everyone in Hawaii should know that this internationally celebrated explorer got his start right here in the Islands, where he taught himself not only botany but also photography.” This earned him much space in National Geographic Magazine.

An early enthusiastic backer was former Governor George R. Carter, who shared a desire “to give the public a volume on the native trees of Hawaii, giving popular as well as technical descriptions of the trees peculiar to Hawaiian soil.” It gives details of all the floral regions embracing the whole plant covering. Rock essentially adopted the earth’s most distinctive flora, and shined such a revealing and reverent light upon an archipelago so isolated from all continents that his works became durable foundations and inspirations. He advised the Marks family on building a superb Botanical Library, now in use at Kauai's NTBG.

Partnerships are expanding to tell his story to share his scholarly and ecological ethics to benefit Hawaii's environment. To celebrate "The Indigenous Trees of the Hawaiian Islands" (issued June 26, 1913) the first of Rock's six books, a symposium, expanded film, book and photo exhibition are planned on this classic explorer- plant hunter, who arrived in Honolulu in 1905. He became Territorial Botanist, worked in Burma, lived 27 years in western China collecting plants, birds, photographs and filming for USDA, National Geographic Society, and Harvard University's Arboretum.

Paul Harris will film an extension of his documentary, "A King in China,” with new material on Hawaii's indigenous forests. A Harris book is planned about the Austrian-American botanist and ethnologist, with 250 photographs and writings from National Geographic and diaries from formative years in Vienna and Hawaii, to life in China, closing with pioneering work on the beautiful pictographic script of the Naxi people.

For information on the co-host institutions, visit websites www.ntbg.org.

Dr. Paul Brennan and Dr. Chuck Burrows will lead an archaeological and historical sites tour on April 6th from 8:30 am to 12:30 pm. Hikers will first see Ulupo Heiau then car pool to “old Kailua,” Liliuokalani’s Retreat and Kukapoki Heiau in upper Maunawili Valley. Participants will learn how the early Hawaiians managed the natural resources of the Kailua ahupua’a and how Chinese and Japanese farmers grew their rice crops and engaged in truck farming in Kawainui and Maunawili.

The tour is sponsored by Ahahui Malama I ka Lokahi, the Kailua Historical Society and theKailua Hawaiian Civic Club. A donation of $10 is requested and reservations will be limited to 30 persons. The group will car pool between sites. Participants should have good footwear and bring bug spray, water and snacks.

Reservations should be made as soon as possible by calling Ahahui Malama I ka Lokahi at (808) 263-8008 or email@ahahui.net.

I'm addicted to Netflix. About once or twice a week, we have time/energy at night to watch a movie before bedtime. My in laws, visiting us for six weeks from Denmark, join us for movie nights since they're living in our house.

The other night, it was my turn to choose, and I was feeling mischevous. With Claus, we only watch action thrillers or foreign films. Musicals, sci fi, serial soaps (like Once Upon A Time), and romantic comedies are usually met with an eye roll. Therefore, as a prank, I picked The Big Gay Musical.

Courtesy: The Big Gay Musical

He came upstairs and I hit play. I snuck a sideways glance at his face in the first minutes of the film because I wanted to laugh at his reaction. I was not disappointed.

Actually, my mother in law, whose English doesn't come easily, was trying to read the title and was like, "The Big Guy Musical?" And then when it started to play, I later learned, my father in law - who pretty much only speaks Danish - complained under his breath.

Unfortunately for Claus and his stepdad, the movie ended up being interesting enough for me to want to stick with it past the first few minutes of the prank. It has a really great opening scene full of funny jokes and nice singing and dancing. The pretty men twirling around in tight or scant clothing entertained me, too.

The movie cuts back and forth between the musical, which is hilarious, and the lives of the two main characters. The musical is used as a tool to let the viewer reflect on what's happening in the characters' lives.

Unfortunately for Claus and his stepdad again, there's a lot of gay sex in the characters' off-stage lives. The movie kind of ratchets up the nudity levels so by the time it reaches its most graphic, you see two nude guys in bed with everything shown except the front. At this point, I think my father in law had had enough, so midway through, they excused themselves to go to sleep.

After the movie ended, Claus and I were lying in bed, winding down with our respective reading material. I had a women's magazine. There was an article about how it's nice to be grateful. There was a little sidebar giving you tips on how to count your blessings.

"Let's play this game," I said to Claus. "Name one thing you're grateful for today."

"I'm grateful that movie is over," he said dryly.

"No, really," I said.

"No, really," he said.

"The magazine says to list in detail why you're grateful," I pressed on.

"I'm grateful I'm done watching a gay musical. That veered into soft porn. With my parents, who I think you traumatized," he elaborated with a stare.

I still thought he was being cynically humorous. I tried to make him keep playing this game. I read another tip from the magazine. "Fine. You can list something you're grateful for, and explain how the absence of it would impact your life," I said.

"I am grateful The Big Gay Musical is over, and I would have been better off if you had not made me watch it," he insisted.

"Be serious," I implored.

"I am serious," he answered. "Your turn."

This husband makes me laugh all the time. I was laughing so hard I was crying. OMG. Did I just watch gay porn with my in laws?

"Well, I have two gratitudes. I'm grateful for you, because you constantly bring humor into my life," I smiled. "And that there's a sequel to The Big Gay Musical. I hear it'll be on Netflix next month."