Flow

by Lois Ann Ell

Driving up to the Princeville Hotel
The rows and rows and clusters of condos
Just keep flowing
White on white on white
Creating long large masses of architecture among the patches of green below and patches of blue beyond

And in the parking lot
The rows and rows of rental cars brand new white green red grey
Parked, everything in order among the hot cement.

And inside the hotel
Beautiful and lavish and foreign
We sit down to tea
Eating little tea sandwiches with salmon and capers and
Croissants with Devonshire cream and sipping English Breakfast and Earl Grey
While spanning the martini menu
In our dresses and heels.
The conversation flows from one direction to the next, one topic into another
All of us connected
But not really

And the group or boondoggle for some software company stumbles in,
Playing a scavenger hunt masked as a team-building exercise masked as a time killer before cocktail hour.
The scavengers flow clumsily into the room as we sip tea looking at them and out over the sea and at each other.
The living room it’s called, as if real everyday living consists of sipping tea in heels or searching for a fruit that goes in a Mai Tai for software team A to cross of the list.

And all of it is so frivolous
But one hour flows into the next and were heading back to the hot grey parking lot towards the car that beeps loudly to unlock the doors for us to heel into our seats and
Go back to work
And husbands
And babies.
As we pull away, we look over the cliffs, silent to the blue below, small white crests steadily pushing into shore.