It's back...

It hardly seems possible that three seasons have passed since winter was here last, but alas, it must be true. I have proof. There is snow falling today.


And the Christmas tree is up.



It seems just last week we were enjoying this...



Oh yeah, it WAS just last week. We visited the local botanical domes. We like going there in the winter. It helps us to forget that it IS winter. Wouldn't you rather be enjoying this?


Than this?


Yeah, me, too.

Thanks, Dad

After reading my post on The Pioneer Woman and after receiving a request from me for some family history, my dad did not disappoint. He sat right down, penned the following, and sent it to me. As a novice genealogy buff, this kind of stuff is like hitting the jackpot. Dates and names of unknown faces might fill in the tree, but this is the heart of it all. Hearing where your family came from and how they lived is an absolute treasure. And for the sake of my kids (it's their family history, too), and because this is the easiest way to disseminate information to them, I'm pasting my dad's memories as the latest piece of the family history pie. Read and enjoy!

I just read your blog concerning the pioneer woman and your desire for more information about my life "way-back-when", so here goes. I'll start with your great grandfather. He left grandmother with three babies, Frank, Mary and Grace in a small Kansas town and made his way to the Kansas-Cherokee Strip line on the 16th of September, 1893. When the cannon was fired, mounted on a fast running horse he had acquired for the event, he raced to an area a few miles south of the line to an area where he staked his claim. He then rode to Alva where he signed the appropriate papers or ownership, then rode back to Kansas, picked up the family in a wagon, with chickens in crates and a milk cow tied behind and proceeded to their new home. Mother and I have visited the homestead and it is nothing but flat, flat country for as far as the eye can see. Since this was the middle of September, winter was soon to come. Granddad put together a "soddy" in which the family lived until a proper home could be constructed. The homestead was located one mile south and two miles east of a town known today as Burlington. Before Burlington, the nearest town was a place called Driftwood, a few miles north of Cherokee. Those Pioneer Women were a tough group of ladies. I can't imagine taking your mother out in the boonies like that and telling her, "Well Dorothy, how do you like your new home?" Dad grew up like all the young men of the day, on the farm. Later, Granddad sold the homestead and moved the family to Cherokee. He was influential in building the town and was a hands-on builder of the First Methodist Church, which still stands today. We took you by the old "big house" when we were in Cherokee for your grandfathers funeral. Remember it? Mom and Dad married when both were eighteen. Dad had been farming while in school and sold a team of mules to buy Mother's engagement ring. It was know as Mom's Team of Mules Ring! The folks continued to farm for several years so, yes, your grandmother was at least an Oklahoma farmer's wife, if not a pioneer woman. Aunt Dot was born a couple of years later and eight years later, in Cherokee's hospital, I was born. As you know, I grew up on cattle ranches. Although Dad did many things to make a living, selling cars, managing a movie theater, farming, managing ranches, etc., he always had cattle. I remember the mornings at the age of eight or nine, sitting on my cow pony waiting for the sun to come up so we could see to start gathering cattle. A child by today's standards, I was expected to do a day's work like a grown man. I learned the greatest lesson a young could be taught, you have to work for everything you get in this life. Success comes from hard work, don't quit, when you get to the end of the rope, tie a knot and hang on. In 1943, Dad bought a 5,000 acre ranch about 20 miles east of Tulsa, the nearest town was Inola. We had 300 mother cows, 15 herd bulls and ran a successful cow/calf operation for several years. I went to school in the fair city of Inola, even played on the high school basketball team, although I spent my time on the bench, I gave everybody fits during practice! To the east of our ranch was one of the Brainerd Ranches. This was a huge operation owned by a conglomerate back east, but the foreman was an old man known as Ben Johnson. His son was Ben Johnson, the movie star who made many movies with John Wayne. Ben, Sr., was one of my heroes (mentioned in my book, The Rancher from Slapout. I knew young Ben, but he spent most of his time at rodeos and he was about five years older, so I was just a dumb kid in his eyes. When Howard Hughes made his movie, Billy the Kid, he sent horse buyers all over Oklahoma looking for stock. They bought several from the Brainerd ranch with the proviso Ben, Jr. accompany them to California. Ben, Jr. made the trip, fell in love with movies and never came home! Another large ranch operation was the Drummond Ranch. I knew the "Marlboro Man's" grandfather and great grandfather. They were typical ranchers of the day. They word was their bond. Another interesting side bar to this story. The doctor I used for my cataract surgery was the Marlboro Man's brother, Jonathan. He has a great practice here in Stillwater. His office is decorated with large photo murals of the old Drummond Ranch.He told me there were too many boys in the family for all of them to make a living on the ranch, so he went to medical school. But we shared many memories about the good old days. Yeah, the pioneer women we quite a bunch and so much a part of my own heritage. I'm proud of them and proud of sharing a bit of this with you. You are very much a part of this heritage, always be proud of who you are! Love you, Dad

Party time!

Today is momentous at our house because as of 8:00 this morning, Pete completed the last of 35 radiation treatments. Bring on the balloons, confetti, streamers, sirens, fireworks, and crazy running around in circles. He even gets a certificate! I told him it had better be framed and hanging on the wall by the time I get home from work. He took this week off to lay low and give his body a chance to recuperate, and it was the best decision ever. And now that he's done, he can slap that magic cream on his leg with abandon (while it makes those burns feel better, it magnifies the radiation if any is left on the skin - not good). Go to town, honey!

Cancer reminds us everyday that it is a silent enemy, lurking in the dark places, threatening to strike out at any moment. We count every single cancer-free day a victory and will celebrate it with joy. Others we know (particularly B & J at church - J has relapsed and is not doing well) have fought the good fight but are not winning the cancer war, and our hearts and prayers are with them.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving. We have so very much to be thankful for. Today, more than anything, I'm just thankful for today. We've made it this far and come to appreciate each and every day as the gift it truly is.

Looking back

Long before feminism was popular, Ponca City, Oklahoma paid homage to the pioneer woman. These brave souls accompanied their men across the prairie for nothing more than the hope of a dream fulfilled, having no idea what really awaited them at the other end. Ponca City honored the pioneer woman by erecting an enormous statue of a woman and her child forging ahead into the unknown and a museum detailing the lives of the early Oklahoma settlers.

I know this, because when I was a child, we used to visit our grandparents in Ponca City and every trip included a walk first to the TG&Y, and then to the museum, where we'd gaze up at the Pioneer Woman in all her larger than life glory.

Imagine my surprise when I heard of a blog entitled "The Pioneer Woman". I took a quick look one day and discovered the chronicling of life on a cattle ranch by a woman who was raised on the golf course, lived the high life in southern California after college, came home for a visit, fell in love with a cowboy, and never left. This premise, in and of itself, holds a certain amount of interest. A little more digging and the real surprise revealed itself. This modern day pioneer woman lives on a cattle ranch in Oklahoma! While her blog doesn't reveal the exact location of the ranch, she does list a mailing address in Tulsa.

This discovery was of particular interest to me because my grandmother was also a "pioneer woman". I do not believe she was raised on a farm (though I'm not 100% sure of this), and she found herself on a cattle spread near, of all places, Tulsa, Oklahoma. An interest has been renewed to learn more about the ranch at Inola (am I right? Is this where it was?) and what life was like there. I'm hoping my dad will read this and consider telling the story of his life herding cattle perched on his painted pony.

The other interesting piece to this story is the fact that a google search of "the pioneer woman" brings up the blog first, before the museum. Not sure what that really means...

It's official

Dear President-elect Obama,

It's no surprise - you did it. I think the word "change" struck a resonant chord from the beginning. Nobody likes war, and particularly when the outcomes are so far removed from the realities of loss. I understand that it's hard to send our young men and women off to war when we can't see immediate rewards for their sacrifice. I think that many people have clung to the hope that you are going to change all that, and that is one of the main reasons you won. We want immediate gratification and it will be very interesting to see what we give up down the road for getting out of Iraq sooner rather than later.

I am just coming to realize that I only thought I was living in a post-Christian nation, but in reality, I'm living in a post-conservative nation as well. With you in the White House and the Democrats ruling the Senate, I think things are about to change for conservatives, and are going to get more than interesting for conservatives who also happen to be Christians. While you are busy trying to protect the rights of gays and lesbians, will my previously-protected-by-the-Constitution rights to believe that God intended marriage for one man and one woman become history? If I dare to believe that God's plan as the Creator and Sustainer of this universe was right from the start am I in danger of being guilty of a hate crime?

Yes, I see change coming, and I think it is time to REALLY clarify what it is I believe and why. Because I think that for conservative Christians, the very core of our belief system is about to be challenged. Thank you, Mr. Obama, for giving me renewed courage to articulate what I believe in the face of mounting odds.

I promise to respect your office and to pray for you. While I have obvious concerns, I will not use them as a reason to bash you, but will commit to carefully considering and articulating them in a constructive way. God will use you to accomplish His purposes. You may be President, but He is GOD.

Today

The air seems heavy with waiting and anticipation. By the end of this day, we'll have change alright...

I drive 30 min. south and east to get to work, and I leave at 7 a.m. to get there on time. I arrive back home at around 5:00 p.m., which doesn't leave alot of time to vote, before having to be at church by 6:30 this evening. This is one election, however, that I don't want to miss, so I was at the polling place by 6:15 this morning and out by 7:05. I was #5 in line. I drove by last night on my way home, having heard that if I got there before 5:00 I could vote on an absentee ballot. There were at least 150 people lined up outside, so I decided to pass on that one and wait until today. I definitely have more patience for waiting early in the day than late.

While I know there are more things at stake than human rights, this most basic and fundamental issue takes top priority in my book. One of today's candidates was the ONLY negative vote in a bill designed to give medical care to babies that survive the unspeakable horror of having been medically aborted though viable. When asked at Saddleback Church when exactly he feels that babies do deserve human rights protection, he said (after umm...ing a bit) that the answer to that question was above his pay grade. And finally, exhibit #3...the comment that while he would teach his daughters morals and values, he would not expect them to be "punished with a baby" for their mistake. To think where this kind of morality will lead us is nothing less than terrifying.

I read an argument recently that by attacking poverty, said candidate will in effect be reducing the number of abortions, because those who can't afford to keep their babies make up the majority of women who have abortions. Economic reasons are not at the heart of his willingness to see his own grandchild aborted in the event of an untimely "mistake". I think it would be interesting to look at the numbers and see how many women KEEP their babies for economic reasons. A monthly welfare check might be a motivator.

I am just as concerned about the poverty in our country as any BO disciple. I'm just not sure the government is the place to land as the end all in poverty-busting. I read the following quote in another blog this morning:

"When our Lord ate with tax collectors and sinners, He did not instruct the tax collectors to organize socially to lower taxes, or to tax only the rich and give it to the poor. He called them instead to personal conversion, to sell all of their belongings and to give the money to the poor, and to follow Him. I do not believe that voting for politicians who say they'll help the poor is the same as helping the poor, nor does it alleviate our responsibility to do so. I myself cannot claim total innocence in this regard."

Well, that's all the time I have for rumination this morning...duty calls. Heidi has much more personal reasons for being pro-life (which obviously, we share). My only "consolation" as I ponder the "changes" we face is that whatever we get is what we deserve - but regardless, God is still in control, and if we witness further moral degradation (and possible moral collapse), it is in His timing, allowed by Him, and for His ultimate purposes.