gail nagasako

I was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan in the shadow of the University and graduated from there with honors. But from third grade, Hawaii had lived in my heart. My teacher had come to Hawaii for her honeymoon and she came back and showed us pictures and taught us the song Aloha Oe, how to make lei out of crepe paper rolls and poinsettias out of paper towels and library paste. (Does anyone remember library paste?) After that, every time I saw anything connected with Hawaii, my yearning increased. Especially during bitterly cold Michigan weather. So two months after graduating, I made my way here. I visit friends and family on the mainland but have never wanted to live anywhere but here, first on O'ahu and now on Maui.

I didn't set out to be a writer. I had a few years experience as a counselor and did personal work on myself and then became a mother, my other life's dream. Mothering was all I'd hoped it would be -- loving and being loved, the excitement of every day being different as our son grew, and the teacher in me was fulfilled, too. We homeschooled until our son was 16, at which time I encouraged him to try school just so he'd have that as part of his experience. He went to school for 3 semesters and then decided there was far too much wasted time in the classes and left to get his GED and pursue his career as a cinematographer. (Hifocused.com)

I had set up a homeschooling group that did social activities and field trips every week and that lasted about 9 years until the kids went off to pursue their unique passions. Our son was and still is a passionate rollerblader and had a career that included X-Games twice and Gravity Games and at one time, he was ranked #4 in the world.

When he no longer needed mothering (we always need our mothers, just not necessarily mothering :-) I was still doing homeschool consulting and it occurred to me that if I was to ever move on from homeschooling myself, I'd better write a book. Thus Homeschooling: Why and How was written. I had written for magazines and newsletters so the book was practically already written. And I wrote almost-daily letters to my dad in Michigan. I actually credit my writing style to those letters. In college, one learns to use big words and long sentences and a mostly formal style. In writing to my dad, my aim was to communicate in the clearest way possible.

Then one day I got to thinking about parenting and how everyone always told me what a great mom I was and I thought I should share my successful actions. Thus Real L.I.F.E. Parenting was born. It's a very short book based on some simple concepts: that one should be REAL -- that is, in the moment, present with ones child, not stuck in worries about the past or future or about what others said. It takes ongoing work to accomplish this and my book gives some exercises to help with that. But I believe we can trust our love and our child's and our presence with one another to guide us. The other concept is in the acronym L.I.F.E. Is our choice Loving, Intelligent, Fair and Empowering. Loving is mostly easy and if we are trying to learn and grow as a parent, being Intelligent grows as well. But so much of parenting can get lost in a power struggle when isn't our aim to help our child be independent? The Fair and Empowering take more work, not only to find that these are important, but also to accomplish them. Our son and I did a LOT of negotiating so any conflict was Fair and Empowering and came to a win-win. Again, some practical help is in the book for these efforts.

My third book, Duckie: a true story, was the result of being told to write it a few times by people to whom I was telling the story. I had been taking photos for years of Duckie and people who loved him so the book practically wrote itself.

Our son is grown now and a new generation of kids is coming along via our "hanai" (Hawaiian for a people who has become a member of our chosen family) kids having kids. I also have two grown children who were born at a time when I could not give them the family life I wanted for them so I gave them up to adoption. I found them when they were in their early 20s and they are now totally a part of our family. We vacation with my daughter, Geralyn, and her husband, John and visit them and their children. We haven't met our great grandson yet because covid cancelled some visits. We plan a trip to Michigan next fall. And we see Jeff on our visits to the mainland and he visits us here, most recently for a long weekend with his adoptive mother.

My husband, Jordan and I, now do volunteer work of various kinds, have a B & B cottage in front our our home with the beach right across a small road. We love to spent time in nature, both here and when we travel. If you ever get to Maui, give us a shout out to say hello. If you are homeschoolers, check out the Maui Homeschool Friends FB page. I'm on FB and IG under my name.

Photos are of daughter, Geralyn with John and Jordan in Sitka, AK; dinner with Jeff and his adoptive mom (both second from the front) and neighbors; with son, Thumper and girlfriend, Heather, in Iao Valley celebrating my birthday this year; and with best friend, Susie, when she and her husband visited recently.