Love  In  Oklahoma
 

It was just a little house in the country near Laverne, Oklahoma.
Many years ago, Mom had a local artist paint the house and the surrounding
yard from a snapshot that she had taken herself.  Perhaps she had it painted
because her ancestors homesteaded on the Cherokee Strip in Oklahoma,
and it reminded her of the past, but it seemed more than that to me.

My Mother's Uncle Willie and Aunt Ellen lived in that house, and I only
got to visit there two or three times when I was a child but the
impression those visits made on my life never left me.

Uncle Willie and Aunt Ellen didn't have much in worldly goods
and they didn't appear to be worried or concerned about it either way.
I never heard them talk about wanting to be anywhere but right where they were,
and they didn't seem to want a lot more than what they had.
They raised four boys in a house not much bigger than most people's living rooms
these days, and without modern conveniences.  There was a small barn,
a few out buildings, and Uncle Willie raised a few farm animals
while Aunt Ellen kept a vegetable garden.

Some might think that it wouldn't be much fun for a child like me to
visit because there were no toys to play with, but there was a water tower
to climb, terrapins to catch, and snakes and horned toads to scare me
and send me running frantically for the house. The soil was so sandy that it seemed
like one big sandbox to me as my brother and I drew lines
in the sand and had our own terrapin races.

While many people spend a lot of money in gift shops for souvenirs
on trips these days, my brother and I took home a turtle and Mom took
home a prickly pear cactus in the trunk of the car and they were free.

I remember being a little frightened because Mom was crying as we drove away
from their house that day and I heard her say to Daddy, "I might not ever see them again."
In my young mind, I didn't understand that the reason Mom was crying was
because she loved Uncle Willie and Aunt Ellen very much and she was afraid
it might be their last visit.  They weren't getting any younger and it was a long way
to Oklahoma.  Vacations and trips were few in those days, and Daddy had
saved buffalo nickels in a big jar for a long time to pay for that particular trip to Oklahoma.

As an adult, I look back on it now and I know it wasn't the house,
the sandy land, or the terrapins I played with that made it special.
It can be summed up in something that I saw in Uncle Willie and Aunt Ellen.
How well I remember that ornery look that came into Uncle Willie's eyes
when he would say something just to get a rise out of the otherwise
calm, sweet Aunt Ellen, and then he would hug her and laugh.
I remember Aunt Ellen as a very caring, tenderhearted woman.

I believe it was the special light that I saw in the eyes of a man
and a woman in love that resulted in the contentment that I noticed in the two of them.
If they disagreed, it didn't interfere with their dedication to each other.
They were happy because they were together and devoted to one another.
They had a solid relationship with God and with their family.
This coupled with the basics of life such as enough food on the table
and shelter from the elements, made their lives complete.

I think they had a secret that most people these days don't know.
They knew how to be thankful.  They knew what was important in life
and they were simply grateful for whatever they had "for richer or for poorer”.
They knew hard times, including the loss of their first child,
the only baby girl ever born to them, yet they survived it all.
Their secret was no secret at all.  It’s something as old as time.
The special light that I saw in their eyes was love, and
it is sad that it is so rare these days, for love is much more than a fleeting sentiment.
True love is stronger than death.

Uncle Willie and Aunt Ellen have been gone from this earth a long time now
but I still keep the picture of their little house in the Oklahoma countryside on my wall.
It reminds me of what I need in my life to be happy and that I really don't need
anything but the basics..."and the greatest of these is love".

By Pamela Blaine
September, 2002