Long Live the Barn 2

I found myself back in my old high school gym overlooking a basketball court. I’ve lived years in that place. I know the smell of the wood floor and how the light darkens as you climb into the dome ceiling. The sound the ball makes when it bangs the floor, like a hollow boom that bounces an echo. And the sudden screech of a stop, the shoe leaves scars of little black slashes.  Upon arrival, I immediately went into disguise, hiding half my face with sunglasses the size of the moon. I was Alice in a black gypsy dress, donning a white fedora and wearing new pink shoes staring down at a familiar rabbit hole.  I was there to honor a fallen fellow player, who at 34, died of cancer and in her memory there was an all-day basketball tournament fundraiser. Even though this event is a noble cause and my rebel native was co-sponsoring, I didn’t want to attend. I’ve never been nostalgic about those days, but I love her so I said, “if you need help, let me know”. She needed help and I was happy to return to the scene of the barn and her warm, smiling face. 

It was a cool June night. The choir was much smaller this time but what they lacked in numbers, they made up for it in energy. City mouse proved that she could shoot a gun which possibly shocked country mouse and with speed and stealth, country dog sniffed out hiding animals.  One of my favorite elements of the barn is the refrigerator. There is a container of worms setting next to mountains of beer. The music is set to loud and you’re encouraged to jump around and sing like a rock star. It seems a fitting celebration for that weekend and it reminds me to remember that within deep sorrow there can be great moments of joy. RIP Metisha Ewbank Welsh 

Long Live the Barn

I’ve recently returned from a trip that has produced a reflection about a previous life. Over the past couple of days, my present self danced with a shadow of a former self and we twirled the nights away. I was visiting my best friend from high school who also happens to live out in the country, outside of a town whose population is small. This mouse has been city for most of my life, except for three years of high school. I was moved out of the largest school in the state to an existence composed of farmers and a graduating class number of 52. It was a shock. One of the first things I did was look for an outsider like me to become lifelong friends. My plan was a success. She was/is a rebel in her native land and will always be special in a shining way, different in her glimmer and possesses a heart the size of forever. I was very excited to see her. Automatically, we slipped into our friendship’s natural pattern and just hung out in a way that is so familiar and easy. Because we are Oklahomans, we have a morbid curiosity about tornado damage, so we drove around looking at broken trees in a straight line, branches jutting out like wooden bones. On the roadway, asphalt had been pulled up and thrown around. We talked about buildings that were once there and were amazed at the buildings that are still standing. This is the prairie. This is boot country.

When we settled down into a deck party, we clinked our glasses, smoked our cigarettes and chatted like chums.  When dusk fell, the night became chilly and every one retired to the barn where there’s a cast iron stove and a lovely bench on which to sit. Enjoying the cool summer wind that came through the big opened door, I sipped my bourbon and laughed, occasionally looking out into the solid black real estate of the outside world. As the evening rolled on, the radio’s volume level began to graduate and when the evening hit it’s fever, we sang like drunks in a midnight choir. We were/are a celebratory bunch. Long live the barn. Long live the country.

Look at the Stars Tonight

The stars tonight are calling. In the country, it’s hard not to look at the sky. The peaceful light  draws the inside of your soul upward until you’re in awe at the magnitude of life and begin to  feel comfort in the fact that you share common elements with the cosmos. We are each other. The human body is mostly comprised of six elements: Carbon, Hydrogen, Nitrogen, Oxygen, Phosphorus, and Sulphur. The acronym is CHNOPS, of which is pronounced like SCHNAPPS. It tickles me to think that the composition of my body consists mainly of liquor.  It seems to fit humankind’s behavior and it’s an echo of Homer Simpson saying that the cause and answer to every problem is drinking. It’s on a continuous circle like the stars, following a deep groove yet floating free enough to swerve through space.

In the country, all of the stars are available. They are crisp, stark and clear, and as a map should do, the outlines of constellations appear and a connection is drawn into the mind of past and present myths. It occurred to me tonight that I could draw my own constellation. There are many stars to connect into many shapes. So what would I pick? What would you pick? What will that symbol speak? I want to cast myself as a legend in my own myth. One that lives life inside a fierce narrative full of treasure and trials, slayed dragons and barroom brawls, carousing and caroling, singing and dancing, following into love and capturing the heart of the one to die for, swashbuckling style. The middle of nowhere grows the best space for an open place that can hold the abyss where epics have room to build.

This is One Day

Today is a rainy day.

I’m in love with its light. The color is a soft grey that doesn’t blind you like sunshine. Unlike the harsh overhead sun-monster, the rainy day hovers and showers down on the green licorice grass. And when it is still, the floating air expands and gently sits in the branches of a dark cedar tree that holds it like a child, snug. I know I’m getting a little carried away but today is so peaceful. Usually it’s a wind storm, battering and pounding on the tin roof that perches above my tiny county house. I’ve lived in tornado alley before, but I lived in the city and had a cozy basement.  My little home, lounging in the middle of the prairie is all alone, is defenseless against devil winds.

Yet, storms are not the only discerning occurrence out here. Rattlesnakes and I share some common spaces. Animals howl and owls hoot and I believe that Lenore is waiting outside with the hounds of hell, crawling over the moor with a death rattle. I’ve read too many stories about goblin fairs and people who are still alive cemented into the wall,  spider webs across a decrypted wedding dress, Little Red Riding Hood, plagues and murders, wicked witches and smooth vampires; spooky is part of my nature. In my brain sleeps decades of horror stories and right now, I sit in the plot of at least five at any given moment. Combine that with the prairie’s whistling wind screaming down the plane, I’ve become very conscious of my surroundings. Like any good Oklahoman, when I get scared, I put my boots on. It’s all about survival.

But then you have today, still and fresh. Everything rests--all in comas, staring up at the sky, content and lackadaisical. And as the day begins to fade, I hear birds chirping and I’m looking through the screen door, thankful for small moments of calm amidst the chaos. 

Happy absent sun day, everyone.