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“The Egrets of Renton Road” is my current painting. It is in the process of drying. by mid February, i hope to be ready for a few coats of retouch varnish and then off to the publisher for reproduction. The tree in this painting is a “South African Fig Tree.” The problem with this tree is in order to reproduce fruit it needs bats to propagate and grow the figs. Unfortunately, there are no bats in Hawaii. Renton Road was the center and main street for the Ewa Sugar Plantation Village. The Ewa Sugar Mill was demolished in 1985 various areas has been deemed an historical site. The site of the tree and surrounding area was for the “Luna”, the managers and owners of the Sugar company. it is in a quaint area of many plantation homes and many owners have refurbished the old plantation style homes. It has a charming rustic sense of place and time.

The Egrets are my favorite bird. They are very strange birds. In the morning they leave their home tree at 5:30 – 6:00 am, heading west to work, crossing over Fort Weaver Road where all the morning traffic is commuting to work….. there are parallels to this story. 6:00 PM they are heading home after catching all the bugs that exist on this side of the island. Workers returning. i can almost set my clock by their going and their coming as they fly right in front of my view of the Ewa Plains. its rather uncanny and if you include their hunting beak…. never missing a bug, worm, roach and centipede, you may develop an appreciation for their strange behavior and unusual appearance as i have.