Lazy W Marie

Carpeing all the diems in semi-rural Oklahoma...xoxo

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finding their own rhythm in the storm

Lynn Crowe Richardson and her husband Jimmy Dale Richardson are born and bred Oklahoma treasures, owners of Teaze dance studio in Midtown OKC, and fixtures in not just the local entertainment scene but also the national and worldwide Rockabilly touring circuits. They are entertainers and creatives who we love dearly. When pandemic hit our state, it hit this beautiful couple in every imaginable way. I am so thankful Lynn took the time to share her experience with me.

March 13, 2020, was the last normal feeling event for Lynn before pandemic changed everything. She had booked a floor entertainment gig at the Osage Casino in northeast Oklahoma. The virus had infiltrated Oklahoma in small numbers then but was not yet spreading a panic. Just a low key rumbling, an unsettled feeling like before a big tornado. Lynn remembers blocking out the casino floor for her feather-adorned showgirls. She remembers distributing party favors and holding face to face conversations with strangers (certainly nobody was wearing masks then), noting that it all felt somehow wrong. She remembers thinking, “Everything is about to change.”

Lynn’s instincts were right. In fact, she was one of the first people here to notice that something was amiss in China, long before the virus was a reality on U.S. soil. With a note of caution and concern that was largely dismissed as fearful or irrelevant, she posted stories about emptied city streets, month long quarantines, and police enforced curfews. She asked astutely why nobody here was taking it seriously. She was, from my perspective, one of our first locals who was heralding the virus on social media. But her livelihood depends on people and lots of interaction. It was a conundrum. This sad irony and basic incongruity of values would come to illustrate much of her coming year. But, as I think you will see, she discovered internal resources that pulled her and her family through it all.

Early on, while doctors were still scrambling to understand the novel corona virus, Lynn and Jimmy both fell ill, twice. They were very sick, exhibiting symptoms like difficulty breathing, fevers, body aches, and even the loss of smell; but neither of them ever tested positive for covid-19, which was bewildering. In March, Jimmy was sick enough to visit the hospital, and the scene there was anything but normal. They waited for nurses in outside tents, and Lynn described the strangeness of not being able to accompany her husband into the hospital when his turn finally came. In September, they were sick all over again; and during this same time Lynn was suffering a tingling in her spine which they suspected was a side effect of the illness. Jimmy has suffered allergies and asthma his entire life, which were exacerbated by the illness. They both recovered eventually, but they suffered plenty in the mean time, depending on affordable over-the-counter medicine and lots of self care to bounce back. Thankfully they are both healthy today.

At every step, Lynn’s telling of these personal stories included a parallel concern for strangers. She said that their ongoing health problems spurred compassion for people who were losing loved ones. Even when their path took them on understandable bouts with anger and frustration, they managed to always arrive again in a place of gratitude for what they have and sensitivity to the fact that others often have it worse. This is exactly her spirit: Simultaneous and heated social awareness with every real personal storm she weathers. My friend is certainly passionate, and the more she told me about her year in pandemic, the more I thought differently about some of the problems I had been hearing about abstractly on the news.

When most people were making mad dashes for emergency quarantine groceries, toilet paper, and hand sanitizer, Lynn’s experience was vastly different. First of all, she had always kept bottled water and paper goods in supply thanks to a warehouse membership and a business practice of providing for her clients. So she had no need to hoard. Secondly, a fact that weirdly delighted me when she shared it, she had months worth of rubbing alcohol and hand sanitizer already at her dance studio, because that is what they always use to clean the poles and keep them clean and grippy. Amazing! I would never have thought of that, ha! She did say that months later, when her normal stockpile ran out, she had trouble finding more alcohol and hand sanitizer in stores because by then everyone needed it.

The third and most troubling difference in Lynn and Jimmy’s early quarantine living conditions was food supply. The Richardsons keep living quarters inside the dance studio on tenth street and have never had much need for long term food storage; nor do they have much space for cooking and preparing meals. Their careers and lifestyle have always lent more to small bites and late night, post-performance dining around town. When the shut downs happened, of course, and area restaurants closed (in the beginning, restaurants were not even offering takeout), they found themselves with extremely limited choices. Add to that their early and severe health troubles and their sudden loss of income, and they were in a worrisome bind.

Lynn said they subsisted for a while on credit cards and then on gifts of food and medicine from friends and family. She shared with me, “We realized for the first time we couldn’t do it on our own.” Eventually they decided to apply for SNAP benefits from the state. The $350 per month made all the difference. They were able to eat and heal and regather their strength to make some tough decisions.

We have all heard anecdotes about how shut downs affected some industries. Lynn and Jimmy experienced perhaps the worst of it. They normally operate four thriving businesses, all revolving around performance arts, both local and traveling. These are more than passion projects, though that is true too. These are their livelihoods and long term plans made real by hard work. These are complicated housing choices. These are life structures that affect them and their three teen aged children, as well. Overnight, 90% of that hard won business just ended. Virtually all of their income was gone, with no reliable end in sight. Even as Oklahoma’s lockdown restrictions eased over the months, people were either reluctant to be in dance studios, or reluctant to spend money for fun, or, as in the case of the big casinos who did open back up, simply not hiring performers.  The sudden and complete loss of income was a blow to them that cannot be exaggerated. Credit cards and savings only got them so far; eventually Jimmy did sell a treasured guitar to pay bills and stay afloat. “

Another expression of the conundrum they faced this year in their chosen industry was travel. Gradually, other states around the country loosened restrictions, and Lynn and Jimmy were offered work. Having missed all of the spring season and much of summertime at home, it made a certain amount of sense to accept jobs in places like Iowa, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Kentucky. Understandably, it was a huge relief to have not just income but also a sense of value, a relief to have something to do. Although most places were not that different from Oklahoma (better safety protocols in large cities, less so in small towns) Lynn said she “was aware of a sense of criticism and public opinion” just for being out and about. There was a constant tug of war over doing the best right thing. “I can only control myself, and I’ve got to be grateful for this job opportunity,” was her resting point. Also, she reinforced, their travel gigs were in spacious outdoor settings. They always felt safe and responsible. It all made her wonder why we have to be so critical of each other, when we are all in this together. She wondered why we weren’t directing more of the vitriol at the government, instead.

Everything was hard last year. Everything, including impossible medical bills for treatment that didn’t help. There were countless reasons to feel increasingly angry at the world, and the online climate of hate speech and division made much of it much worse. Lynn felt that she lost friendships in the midst of everything and watched with sadness as groups in general caved to mistreating each other both online and in the streets. Lynn’s perspective is that all the fighting and negative leadership was keeping everyone embroiled in their anger, rather than freeing us up to solve our collective problems. She realized at some point that no great entity was coming to save us, that it was up to individual humans to support each other. It was an emotional learning curve, but a needed one. It seems to have centered her in self empowerment as well as reminders about who will love you always, who will be there for you no matter what. During those months of isolation, she lovingly reinvested in family ties and lifelong friendships.

Did the heated political climate have an influence on the mood of pandemic, I asked her? “Oh yeah.” From her perspective, she was largely at odds with friends and family in both arenas. People’s feelings about the virus were intertwined with their political belief systems, and many people could not discuss one without discussing the other. It all seemed to heighten the underlying conflicts we have felt since 2017, and also we seemed to have latched onto an ugliness in our language that just wasn’t there before. Despite her own strong opinions on many important topics, Lynn chose to sidestep conflict in person to preserve relationships. (But she did giggle and admit to some passive aggressive venting online sometimes, ha!)

I loved hearing her talk about the teenaged kids in their family, about what good listeners and sharp conversationalists they are, how they care about the environment and seem to possess that spark for change and progress. “They are not so close minded. They are more socially aware, and it gives me hope that things can get way better with this next generation.” What a balm, in the face of concern for the progress we have made since the 1960s, she said.

Since the Presidential election last November, Lynn acknowledges a sense of cautious relief. She said that while things are still not perfect, what we feel now is humane. “I am no longer watching politics all day, no longer terrified of what’s coming next. That alone is a weight off my shoulders.”

Lynn also has clear ideas about how the government could have done more to help small businesses like hers, citing the huge windfalls that benefitted large corporations and the lack of trickle down for smaller entities. She explained to me the complexities of the EIDL and paycheck protection system, things for which I had no scope of understanding, bemoaning the contradictions inherent in grant and loan qualifications for unique businesses like hers. It was more of that conundrum, the constant choice between survival in your chosen life and shifting gears entirely. “We had lots of pressure and distress over seeking temporary work, and month by month we made it, we were so grateful.”

She suggested, reasonably, that there was a lack of monitoring of people who had truly lost their income, yet stimulus checks were going out to so many, without any proof of need. For a while, Lynn appreciated the efforts of former Congresswoman Kendra Horn, who conducted town hall meetings and advocated for businesses when she could. But Horn was not reelected, and after that no one stepped in to help.

Lynn bravely intimated that she had many days when she felt extra dark, like she was “going crazy.” The circumstances grew so bleak, and the difficulty just never let up. Incredibly, even these moments spurred her compassion. She told me it gave her pause to think about people who deal with anxiety and depression even in good times. “I can’t even imagine how people are coping.” Her voice dripped with love like honey.

If all we did was gaze at her intense and ongoing hardships of this past year, we might feel broken and defeated on Lynn’s behalf. But don’t bother with that. Because she doesn’t feel that way! As we talked, Lynn said that it was often “tempting to look at what was going wrong,” but she tried to “focus on what was going right, and there has been a lot.”

She sees how extra down time afforded her the chance to de-stress, de-clutter, and get organized in a big way, finally completing a huge paperless project in her office and working on backlogged paperwork.

She sees that songwriting seeds planted decades ago are now coming to fruition, with her husband scoring a huge new recording deal and touring gig with a beloved musical comrade: “How miraculous to see it blossom now, at such a bizarre time in history.”

She sees fresh energy in Oklahoma City, with more and more parties booking at her studio every week. She sees the beginning of a 21st century Golden Age, a boom for the performing arts, a ribbon of entrepreneurial creativity and determination that wasn’t as necessary last year. She got me excited, reflecting on the 1920s and talking about the possibility of a New Golden Age: “Why not another one now?”

As this new year builds momentum, the Richardsons are healthy and happy and working hard on their goals. They look forward to going on tour, scheduling shows every weekend, and keeping the studio open for classes and parties. Happily, several big festivals that were cancelled in 2020 seem likely to happen later this year. They are excited to regain their financial strength so they can give back to the community, too. Again, this reveals Lynn’s depth of compassion. For all their challenges during pandemic, she is mindful that others have had it even worse, and she sees where people can step in to help each other.

I am excited for their momentum, too, and not just because they are our friends and we love them. Their artistic contributions provide a particular flavor to our local culture that we have been sorely missing. One lesson pandemic has taught many of us is the true value of what we take for granted.

Thank goodness for the people who make art their life, so that we all can live with more beauty and more variety. Thank goodness for the entertainers, the creatives, the musicians and dancers, who teach and perform and share their passions so generously, yet are considered almost disposable. May we not take them for granted in our New Golden Age.

If last March felt like the scary tension that precedes a big tornado, then maybe this March feels like the peace that follows. Lynn described to me, “that beautiful blue, cloud free sky.” and I could feel the depth of hope she must have for this new season of life. All this regeneration. Infections rates are falling. Vaccinations are taking hold. Their business is growing steadily again. And, most important of all, she and her husband made it through what was arguably one of the worst years of their lives. She said they have felt beaten and battle weary, but also excited because, “If we can do this, we can do anything!’

I asked Lynn for her final perspective on everything, for lessons learned and mantras going forward. She took a deep breath and said, “Just be gentle with yourself.  Stop worrying about what others are doing.” She talked about times when she had to remind herself, “This is who we are. This is what we’re doing.” And that focus, with a deep sense of compassion and gratitude, is what kept her going.

Dig deep, friends.
xoxoxoxo

shelby, tender & immovable

Welcome to the first of many Covid Pandemic Interviews! I am so happy to introduce my sister in law’s sister, my brother’s sister in law, and my friend, Shelby. I know you will love her and be in awe of her story.

Before the Storm:

In December 2019, Shelby and her husband Mark returned to live in their home state of Oklahoma after a short chapter on the east coast. They were drawn home by family, numerous small town Oklahoma festivals, and the superior Tex Mex food culture here (amen). An experienced cardiac step-down nurse, Shelby began work in one of Oklahoma’s largest hospitals on January 6th, 2020. She worked in the Intensive Care Unit, unaware that within weeks she and her team would be at the eye of the storm.

By early February, 2020, Shelby had heard of the novel corona virus but not experienced it firsthand. Testing was expensive, scarce, and mostly being done for patients who had recently been overseas.

The last normal feeling thing Shelby remembers doing was eating at Ted’s Escondido, enjoying one of those much anticipated Tex Mex dinners she just couldn’t find on the east coast. Soon after, cases in Oklahoma started to rise and the hospitals filled up with very sick people. On an otherwise normal Monday at work, in early March 2020, she said everything felt different. She and her team were assembled and instructed to wear both surgical and N-95 masks at all times, a behavior which suggested that they themselves might be contagious. This seized her attention. The fear of spreading the virus from hospital patients to loved ones at home was forefront, so Shelby immediately chose to self-isolate, spending more than a month sleeping in the living room, separated from Mark and keeping her hospital clothes apart from his, just in case.

Ground Zero:

Shelby worked at a hospital where patients from around the state were transferred, when smaller hospitals could not treat them. She described their atmosphere as one of extreme caution, since the virus was so new and so many questions were being raised every day. “The science was unfolding before our eyes,” she said, and they were “learning as they go.” Before long, they were at 110% capacity, with 38% of those patients very sick with Covid-19. People were dying horrible deaths, PPE was being conserved, and the doctors and nurses were scrambling to learn enough to effectively battle the new enemy. The hospital was overrun and understaffed, and growing more so as lucrative travel team jobs lured nurses away to even harder hit states. Shelby chose to stay, both to be near her family and because she already felt invested in her team and mission.

Prior to the covid-19 pandemic, Shelby was a nurse in the cardiac step down unit and was happy there. But her initiation into ICU just a few weeks before such an exceptional time in history seems almost predestined. In the midst of so many horrors and so much uncertainty, she found deep purpose in caring for the extremely sick and called it “an honor” to hold the hands of so many who would not survive the virus. She and her teammates at the hospital, her “work soul mates” as she affectionately called them, made sure no one ever died alone. Shelby was among the nurses we have seen on television who used Zoom and iPads on wheels to help loved ones say goodbye.

One of the difficult realities of the hospital being so overrun was that chaplains on staff could not often see dying patients. For this reason, Shelby and her team were frequently tasked with providing more than medical care. She was put in a unique position to minister to people in their final hours and moments. She always asked, “Would you like me to pray?” And, she said, they always accepted. No patient ever told her no.

For those patients who recovered, left the ICU, and were eventually discharged, Shelby and her team celebrated. She said it was a victory they shared together, because they all cared so deeply for the people entrusted to them. They loved and prayed for everyone.

While acknowledging that ICU burnout is prevalent and a real concern, she does not foresee a career change anytime soon, and not only because covid numbers are finally improving. The environment of deeply caring for one or two patients seems to fit her personality. She finds herself thinking about them all the time, praying for them, becoming invested in their stories. Shelby is unabashed about her faith, too. She said, “He gets me, He sees me,” and credits God and prayer for helping her do the needed work and thrive in such a hard year.

Connection, Self Care & the Vaccine:

The horror stories ramped up, and Oklahoma’s infection rate swelled again and again as we approached first summer then winter. Long, exhausting hours at work were balanced with tentative, masked, outdoor visits with her parents and sometimes with her sister and nephews, who were visiting Oklahoma before moving overseas. This warm, gregarious, affectionate family had a hard time not hugging. They sufficed with small patio gatherings and lots of extra phone calls. She said it was so hard to “pump the brakes” when spending time with them, difficult to resist the urge to hold or comfort a toddler, to comfort each other. But seeing what she saw every day at work, it was ultimately an easy choice.

Self isolation took many forms, and Shelby always kept her parents’ health and safety in focus. She stepped in to do the grocery shopping for them, eliminating the temptation to eat in restaurants. She and Mark found a rhythm with their safety protocols at home and also learned a new love language which told him when she might need to cuddle after work and when she might need to be alone with her feelings. Or with a pizza. Besides pizza, Shelby’s pandemic stress snack of choice was Triscuits with pimiento cheese dip, particularly the ones with either smoked gouda or jalapenos.

Socializing simply could not happen. All their hopes and plans to reunite with Oklahoma friends have been tabled this past year, and they watched as one by one the small town festivals were cancelled.

Neither Shelby nor her husband Mark, nor their adult daughter Boston, who is a restaurant manager in Ada and faced constant exposure and a complicated, ever shifting work life, nor Shelby’s parents, ever contracted the virus. It’s easy to imagine how thankful they all are to have survived the year without serious illness or worse.

There was a long stretch last year when, though physically healthy, Shelby found it difficult to concentrate long enough to read books (a common phenomenon in pandemic, I am learning). Instead, she listened to audio books, favoring mysteries and gothic romances for an escape. Shelby also rewatched the Hobbit series and binged The Office with Mark, although they had seen it before.

We talked about mental health and the cultivation of peace in the midst of such fear and chaos. Shelby used the word “curate” to describe how she took control of her online life. She unfollowed political accounts and people whose posts were too disruptive to her peace of mind then filled that void with Facebook groups about her genuine interests, like stained glass art, gardening, and cathedrals. She chose to nourish herself in gentle, deliberate ways. “A lot of us spend a lot of time in our heads,” she observed wisely. This already smart, glowing woman seemed to have learned that furnishing her mind with beautiful things would keep her sane and centered. “Find the joy where you can,” she told me. (Again I say amen!)

We spoke at length about the vaccine, about how she felt when it was first announced, and about her experience.  Having to work a full shift the first day the vaccine was available to her, she got in line and was vaccinated as soon as possible on day two. Shelby called the feeling “indescribable” and admitted to crying.  “Is this it? Is this the end of things?” she thought, and, “finally we’re going to get a leg up.” Her voice broke at this, and I got that giggly, warm, weepy feeling just listening to her recount the memory. The relief was palpable.

She also told me a story about a colleague, a long time male nurse who was videoed receiving his vaccination. Normally a stoic guy, unemotional and gruff though experienced as a first responder in a wide array of tragedies and historic medical events over the decades, this man wept as he received his shot. He broke down in front of his friends and colleagues and offered them this intimate assurance, his blessing to weep and be moved: “They don’t know what we’ve seen.”

Reflecting on the Year & Looking Forward:

I asked Shelby what she wishes people would do differently, given her perspective. How does she believe society could have handled this better? Her answer was chilling and not what I expected. She said gently and firmly that everyone should have a living will. We should leave instructions for our loved ones that clearly state our wishes for the end of life. She saw many patients whose conditions declined so rapidly toward “medical futility” that, on the worst days of their lives, families did not know what to do. They faced impossible, tormenting decisions because the patients could not speak for themselves, and they often had to make these decisions without being able to see their loved ones. Establishing a living will in healthy times is a gift to your family later.

I asked Shelby whether the pandemic has changed her. First she announced that it certainly opened her up to the power of hand washing, ha! And she described all the reasons why our new normal might include wearing a mask for air travel or to minimize cold and flu season. In fact, she talked about mask wearing overall, about how it has been such a small concession for people to make, just kind of shaking her head at the resistance some groups showed.

Shelby also joked about how our Oklahoma-bred tornado preparedness might have to mature into something broader, to serve as a buffer against future mass crises. Regarding Doomsday Preppers? “Nobody’s laughing now!” We chuckled at that but only for a moment.

She also expressed with some gravity that “the pandemic was eye opening on so many levels, we were all so unprepared.” And she expressed her hope that “smart people are preparing for this to happen again.”  She considers herself “cautious to a fault” now and, as with her faith, makes no apologies.

Shelby’s spirit seems to be not just unharmed but perhaps bolstered. Despite all the trauma, uncertainty, pain, isolation, and heart-wrenching work of the past year, all of it unplanned and unprecedented, she presses into the belief that “Life is resilient.” When I heard her speak those words on the phone last week, I felt it. Now, when I just think of her saying those words, it feels like a quilt made of very old, beautiful velvet and denim, soft and strong and reliable. A trustworthy fact that will keep us warm. Life is resilient.

Shelby and I spoke on the evening of  March 4, 2021, nearly one full year after she began wearing two masks at work and started her voluntary self isolation in her living room. Oklahoma numbers are down now and falling steadily every week. Vaccinations, amazingly, are gaining traction statewide. And she and her family remain safe and healthy. All gifts for which to be wildly thankful.

I know that all of us who watched the news all year and witnessed as best we could the love being poured out through nurses and doctors want to give Shelby the biggest hug right now. We want her, and her work family, to feel all of our appreciation. We want their deep reservoirs of compassion and fortitude to be replenished in abundance, for their own happiness and well being as well as for whatever is coming next. We need them to be whole and well nourished.

One of the final sentences Shelby offered me was just what I needed to hear, just what we all need to hear sometimes: “I knew life could be hard, but I never lost hope that things would get better.” And so, no matter what any of us faces, no matter how real the threat or how long and hard the battle, we absolutely must not lose hope. Things will get better.

Thank you, Shelby, from the very bottom, neediest place in my heart.

hello, happy march!

I am so deeply refreshed to be in this third month of the new year, teetering giddily on the knife edge of springtime. The farm has thankfully survived every brutal winter storm that has come our way since last October. Our family is thriving and reaching warmly, patiently, towards brand new miracles. Every day I feel more of that old, familiar, vernal energy thrumming against my bones. It feels the way dirt smells, and it enlivens all my work. It makes everything seem not just possible but also purposeful. That’s beautiful.

Last week, on a whim, we hung LED lights around the outside edge of the yurt. It’s one more quirky layer added to the structure, wildly imperfect and sparkling and welcoming. Hopefully we will soon be filling the yurt itself with people.

Also last week, I finally took time to start a few trays of seeds, and before the weekend arrived they had already sprouted. All of them! So I planted more and eventually hung a bigger sun lamp. I never get tired of this miracle. Genovese basil, several beautiful kinds of tomatoes (especially excited about the tie dye variety) and sweet peppers, Queen Anne’s Lace, Bergamot, tomatillos, and more. I have lots of gourmet lettuce blend growing, too, in those large plastic clamshells you buy filled with fancy salad mix in the produce department. I find this clever repurposing, well, clever. It’s the best tiny greenhouse money doesn’t even have to buy (twice).

I want to prune and clean the gardens hard, but expereince tells me to wait a few more weeks, maybe into late April this year. In the flower beds and herb garden, I have only scooted away enough oak leaves to enjoy the early-blooming tulips and daffodils. That much is safe. But overall, we will have to endure the widespread, messy, sepia dormancy a while longer, for the safety of all those perennials and shrubs still in hiding. Happily, I do see feathery, ruby colored buds on my hydrangeas and hints of electric green in the deepest twigs of my boxwoods. Just like hope, the beginning of springtime is quiet and shy but certainly there.

Last Thursday I launched a story-telling-slash-interview project to commemorate one year in pandemic. My heart’s desire is to collect and share as many varied stories as possible, to capture our collective and individual pandemic memories. Such a time in history! It will all eventually be printed into a booklet, for our time capsule. I want the good, the bad, the scary, the historic, the funny, all of it. Friends and family volunteered quickly, and as of today I have nine interviews completed with seventeen in the wings, ready to Zoom. The stories are all so interesting, I love it. And I love you all for sharing. Stay tuned for each of those to appear individually!

On the topic of interviewing people, if you are fortunate enough to still have your parents alive and in your life, I strongly encourage you to ask them questions as if they are normal people. Very interesting. Who knew parents had so many original thoughts and ideas? Amazing.

Closing up for tonight, friends. I hope you are feeling some of the refreshment of early spring. I hope you are enjoying the slightly longer days and the noticeably warmer skies. Do you want to participate in the pandemic interview project? Drop me a note! Everyone is welcome.

“Behold, my friends, the spring is come;
the earth has gladly received the embraces of the sun,
and we shall soon see the results of their love!”
~Sitting Bull
XOXOXO

duck tales, a-woo-hoo

Between what ages would a person be to have read the title of this blog post as a cartoon jingle, and what after school snack are you now craving?

On the first brutally cold morning of this artic storm in Oklahoma (in every where), our two ducks were so cold they were struggling to walk in the south coop, so we quickly brought them into the house to warm up. They took up residence in the downstairs (pink) baththroom and have provided loads of entertainment ever since. Their bathtub days are numbered, though, as the forecast continues to imporove, so I am sharing a few stories to really soak up the moment.

Rick Astlee and Klaus in a friendly stare off,
Mike Meyers Lemon doing his own thing as usual.

First, Klaus believes this is all for him. He believes we brought them indoors for his pleasure alone, and he has established a routine where two or three (or seven) times per hour he interrupts us, staring unblinkingly at us from his soul, and leads us to the closed bathroom door. The instant we open the door and he can see the ducks, his tail starts wagging. No, his whole, long, substantial body starts wagging. He grins wolfishly and pants in a baritone way, gazing left and right and in small, slow circles as Rick Astlee and Mike Meyers Lemon scuttle around the towel-lined bathtub. After a few minutes of tense but safely guarded interaction, we escort Klaus out and close the door. For the next three or four minutes, our gentle giant finds the nearest stuffed animal and thrashes it hard, violently I am afraid; then he runs back and forth across the concrete floor, smiling like it’s his birthday. Then he usually falls asleep. This routine is literally the first thing he does upon waking up in the morning and the very last thing he does before retiring at bedtime. We are powerless against his begging. I do not know how we will handle the emotional void when the ducks return to their chicken flock.

Next, the ducks are noisy. I mean, quacking is the least of it. They are big and strong (for ducks, at least, in my limited duck experience) and highly energetic. They make lots and lots of racket, especially when we run them some warm bath water to play in. Today as we exited the bathroom for them to swim peacefully alone, they went bezerk. Mike Meyers Lemon especially flipped upside down, spun in tight little counterclockwise circles, and dove repeatedly, in that wonderful dramatic duck-swoop way, into the foot-deep warm water. It was quite a sight. Even without the water to splash, though, they climb and wrestle and pitter patter nonstop until about 9:00 p.m. It’s amazing and sweet.

Also, my favorite beach towel: Will my favorite beach towel, which I grabbed that first day to warm up the ducks, ever be the same again after their indiscriminate filthiness? No. The ducks defacated all over it and embedded seed like it was a mosaic project. Goodbye, blue and green sea turtle beach towel that was the perfect length for me. You died a noble death. Thank you for all the paperback reading-sunburn-on-the-deck memories.

The ducks’ indoor adventure has coincided with the widespread energy crisis in Oklahoma (and beyond), at the epicenter of which my husband has been working an average of 16 hour days. He is virtually undistractible while working this hard on something this important; but today at a relatively calm moment, he heard the ducks’ chaos from his upstairs office. My tall, handsome, super smart, thunder-and-lightning bolt husband appeared just to playfully reprimand our temporary houseguests: “You ducks better caaaallmmm doooowwn! That’s enough! You’re being crazy! We are gonna have to burn this bathroom down after this!” Sadly, they ignored him wholesale and continued their white water party. This man has been crafting large scale, unheard of solutions to unprecedented crises all week long, fearlessly confronting people in much higher positions than his. And then he was ignored and flatly disobeyed by a pair of two year old water fowl.

One more note about the ducks’ indiscriminate filthiness: The smell is pretty special. Have you ever been to, like, a herpatarium at the zoo, and there is also a cat’s litter box in there for some reason?

The End.

romance right now

Happy Valentine’s Day, friends! Is your romantic celebration looking different this year? Ours definitely is. And I actually love it.

My husband has been working extraordinary hours this month. His normal Commish responsibilities, plus the weight of legislative season, all compounded by the ongoing complex problems brought to the utility industries by this crazy weather… The man is giving it all, 24/7. Although we have been together at the farm pretty solid since mid March of last year, these recent weeks he has felt a bit absent. Even when he emerges from his upstairs office, he is barraged with phone calls, texts, emails, and ongoing new emergencies at all hours of the day, every day. We never know how much down time we are going to enjoy together.

This may sound a bit grueling for our marriage, like a low key complaint, but that’s not at all how I mean it.

Not only am I immensely proud of the work he does, and the fact that he is happy to pour himself into it, but also I see a few beautiful daily constants remain for us:

We always drink coffee together in the morning; we never miss dinner together; and we always go to bed at the same time. There are plenty more sweet, unexpected ribbons of time together throughout each day, for which I am thankful, but the other day it struck me that those three rituals seem to be non negotiable. What a gift.

I am thankful that we have such a well established rhythm and harmony, so we can absorb disruptions of every variety and remain in step. I am thankful that our feelings come from somewhere deep, like abundant well water, rather than from intermittent rainfall. We can keep up with shifting circumstances, and I love that.

This snapshot was taken in the French Quarter at a very cool little artists’ walk we both love. He was refusing to let me smooch him like I wanted to. Then he grabbed me and held me up in the air. xoxo

For posterity, I feel like documenting what romance looks like this Valentine’s weekend, in pandemic, during an historic winter storm, while my man is purely exhausted from his day job:

Romance in times like these can look like chopping the frozen pond and troughs several times per day.

It can look like taking overlapping conference calls in ear buds so he can drive to town and buy horse blankets because his wife is worried sick about Chanta and Dusty.

Romance can be grocery shopping together well ahead of the snowstorm and unceremoniously handing each other boxes of chocolate to take home, then laughing out loud inside our masks like it’s the best joke ever.

Romance, in fact, is laughing together every chance we get, at anything we want. It’s also watching documentaries together, and freely criticizing strangers who join cults.

Romance is trading prayer requests with each other, for the people each of us talks to separately, as well as updating each other on good news and difficult news. Romance is counting our blessings as if it is the counting of them that makes them real.

Romance turns out to be old school, crayon-decorated coupons for massages that he is too tired to give and future outings that we cannot guarantee, because the tradition is old and good and happy. Romance can be homemade brownies filled with chopped up candy bars. Steaks that are sort of shaped like hearts and layers and layers of silky, fuzzy blankets.

Romance is obsessively loving every single animal together, so much. It is wearing your black felt cowboy hat and winter coat with the upturned collar (so sexy) to gather shivering ducks so they can warm up in the bathtub and then cuddling an overly attached a cat who won’t stop fake nursing our blankets. Romance is clearing ice from horse hooves even though your sweatpants are making you crazy and your eyes hurt.

Romance is troubleshooting every single cool breeze you detect and investigating every sound that might be a troubled pipe.

Romance is checking on your friends together and being proud of the kids together.

Romance is selecting television distractions that won’t drive your wife too crazy and playing UNO even when you are dead tired and she mostly wins. : )

A different hat than he gets to wear this week, but honestly he wears them all so well.

Sometimes romance is jewelry and rose bouquets, fancy restaurant dinners and cologne. But we have no need of that stuff now.

Gulf coast getaway 2019

Soon, babe, we will get dressed up, go out on the town, and maybe even travel. Until then, I am happy to get bundled up and care for the farm together.

I am so happy to cook our dinners and desserts here, take hasty hot showers to protect the septic field, and live thereafter in soft pajamas. These nine acres are paradise to me, and you make it all better. You embody all the romance in the world, and I am so glad you are still my Valentine.

NOW DRAW FOUR BITCHEZ
XOXOXOXO