Summer ended, as it usually does. But this one was a little different. This summer of '62 marked the end of childhood, a real end of a special season. College was next -- I'd have plenty of time to screw that up in the years to come.

While I was a freshman at college, the family would move out of the Ekaha home into new digs on Reed's Island. I'd never come home to Ekaha Street again. But I can never erase those memories of the light-green house that I grew up in. My family would often joke about it, but I would always take a short drive up there every time I returned home to Hilo, just to take a peek at the wonderful old house, and to reflect in wonder how small everything seems today.

I can't begin to tell you how empty I felt as September drew near in 1962. It was a combination of fear, anxiety, anticipation, and a little bit of sadness. The day came, much too soon, when we piled into the Chrysler and wended our way to Hilo Airport, where I'd soon be hopping a plane to Honolulu and my first year at the University of Hawaii.

It hit me as we got underway. This was it. This was the day we'd all been pointing toward, since the day Dad, Mom and I stepped off the airplane and into Obachan's house for the first time.

Hilo had grown up, just as I had grown up in the past fifteen years. The town had seen great times, and devastating disaster. We changed together -- Hilo and me. I am the product of what my home town and I made of each other. Quite simply put, Hilo was a great place in which to grow up.

But now, I was ready to make my move. Never -- since the day I took my first wobbly, unsure step as a child -- was I more prepared to take on the world.

Most of us don't realize that as we encourage our children to walk, we are actually teaching them independence and giving them the tools they need to break the parental chains that keep families together during the childrens' formative years. I know that now, I had no idea at the time.

We had just made the turn from Ekaha Street onto Waianuenue Avenue -- as we had thousands of times before -- when Dad spoke the words I will always remember, and in fact repeated to my own sons the day each left for college:

"Today, you are a man."