Sitting here in the dark of my office…in Oklahoma. About 2 hrs from the scene of the tornado. Sky gray and dreary. Processing things in my head. Processing all the images I looked at last night and this morning. The ones with parents searching for their children in the rubble. The ones with a teacher hugging his student so desperately to his chest. The ones with cars piled in a heap on the middle of the interstate. The ones with young couples standing over their home with a lone picture frame.
And it breaks my heart. Bringing tears to my eyes when I try to put myself in their skin. Their skin. How it must feel to lose. Everything. How it must feel to wait in that church to be reunited with your kids. Or the ones who wait and find out they’ll be waiting a reeeally long time. To be reunited.
And my heart hurts. And breaks. For these neighbors of mine.
I sit here wondering how to put thoughts into words. How to capture the feelings I feel right now. And all I know is to write from my heart. So I’m going to do that…
Dear Oklahoma,
When I first stepped onto your land 2 years ago, a baby in my belly, two toddler girls in tow, and a husband bravely moving us here, I kind of didn’t like you. I stepped off that plane and looked all around me…the open plains…the brown buildings…the hot, dry air. For the green. For the water. For the fields of fruit. For the clam bakes and the fish fry’s.
And I didn’t see any. Not a single one.
And I struggled with that I guess. That you were different from anything I had ever known. That you caused me to look for a different kind of beauty. A different way of living.
And I tried really hard. To like you. To experience you. Oh how I wanted to embrace you, to love you, to accept you for who you were. I went to your rodeos and I wore your cowgirl boots. I lived at the pool during your hot summers. And visited your natural wonders on weekends with my family. I loved on your horses, and your cattle, and ate your fine beef. I photographed your fields, and your sunsets, and your wide open spaces.
But in my heart of hearts I think mine sunk a little when we moved here. Because Oklahoma is different for me. Different from everything I’ve ever known and it’s been hard, to be honest. To love you like you were my own. (And I’ve never wanted to put that in writing for fear that people will misunderstand me.)
I’m going to be honest and tell you, that me and God have had a lot of conversations about you, Oklahoma. A lot of arguments about where we should be, where we should raise our family, where we should stake our roots. And it’s been such a day-by-day thing for me. Learning to bloom where I’m planted. Learning to love the plains and the heat and the dry. I think I reached a point where I learned to love you for who you are, but never felt like you were mine. My Oklahoma.
But yesterday?
I felt it.
When the news came streaming through our radio, I felt my skin bristle with protective instincts. My heart ache for the moms and the dads waiting in that church to be reunited with their kids. My heart swell with pride for the firefighters. My heart was in sync with those Okies. And for the first time in 2 years, I think you were home for me, Oklahoma.
Like those were my neighbors being rescued. Those were my people who were searching for their loved one. My friends who were standing over their homes with picture frames.
And I guess me and you, Oklahoma?
Our eastern and western hearts are in sync.
And it feels good to be home after all this time.
Love with all my heart,
Mary Beth
For those of you who are local to Tulsa, Kathleen’s Kids boutiqueis accepting donations between now and Friday at 5:30pm. Ideas include: water, non-perishable food items, paper towels, toiletries, clothing, infant/baby clothing & supplies, etc. They will be lovingly delivered to Moore, Oklahoma on Saturday.
Additional ways to help?
//Old Try is donating some of the proceeds from their shirts on their Oklahoma page to the relief fund. You can purchase their fabulous items: here.
//You can donate directly to The Salvation Army at this address:
The Salvation Army Disaster Relief
P.O. Box 12600
Oklahoma City, OK 73157.
(Designate Oklahoma Tornado Relief on all checks.)
Text REDCROSS to 90999 to make a $10 donation
Or visit website here: http://www.redcross.org/ok/oklahoma-city
//The Tulsa Community Foundation has set up the Moore & Shawnee Tornado Relief Fund. Contributions may be made at www.TulsaCF.org.
Please comment with additional ways to help the people of Moore, Oklahoma…
1./ barefoot. in my kitchen. wearing nail polish i took the time to put on 3 weekends ago. chipped…a little messy. but it’s me. the real me. i wonder sometimes if you could come into my home…would i seem like the same person you read about on here? would you know it’s me with all my frazzled mistakes and my big broken heart? could you tell? would you see me photographing our life. keller eating parsnip chips next to me and pressing the “enter” button on my keyboard. the girls playing outside with rolly pollies. watching angelina ballerina in my bedroom. steven and i working late into the night in our office…a baby in the crib…the girls asleep on the couch. would you feel at home? would you feel loved? could you tell that jesus lives in my heart? i wonder…i hope. i ask God almost every day to use me here…not only with this little blog, but in real life too.
2./ starbucks morning. sometimes when you can’t fit it all in, you have to eat out to make it though a morning. we tried their peaches and cream muffins…may i just say? WORTH ever calorie and every red cent. go try them!
3./ moving. not us…thankfully! these guys came around and moved oh so close to us. i’m basically on cloud nine. i’m basically planning our futures together. basically. ;-)
4./ estate saling. the thing with yard sales, is that half the time i can’t stop because i don’t have cash with me. but the beauty/danger of estate sales is that they take debit cards. someone might as well pull out the handcuffs and chain me to my steering wheel. because you can bet i’m going to turn around and take a peek. this particular one had a grip on me like no other…vintage stove {working and everything!}, vintage dresses, vintage jewelry, etc. i snagged a necklace and posted it on instagramhere. i had my eye on these mirrors, but decided i better wait till saturday and see if they made it. me and God have a lot of bargaining conversations during interim periods such as these. lo and behold they were still there on sat morning and i snatched them up for half price!
5./ making do. i’m trying so hard to make our groceries last till we leave for our trip. making do with what we already have in our pantry…so smoothies and banana bread it was for lunch! the kids thought they died and went to heaven. i thought we were in trouble when i looked in our fridge. basically cheese and a shriveled kiwi were all we had left {i caved, by the way, and loaded up on groceries yesterday. :)} does anyone else declare competitions on your kitchen, like i do?
6./ fish. i am such a weirdo, i know. i have to make myself cook meat for the family on occasion…mostly for steven’s sake…mostly so the kids aren’t in counseling one day feeling deprived. that fish has been sitting in my freezer forever and since we’re doing the whole clearing out of the groceries, i decided it was time to put my big girl pants on and just deal with it. it totally grosses me out it and i remind steven what sacrifices i’m making as i pray my way through the cutting off of the plastic and the rinsing. {dramatic, much?!} he rolls his eyes and gives me no sympathy. this is certainly no indication of my love for meat, though, and every indication of how much i love him. i can down a mc double at mc donald’s like no other. i dare you to beat me.
7./ business stuff. some of you have asked what our business is. what we do, how we do it. i wish i could tell you…we haven’t exactly nailed it down yet. but it’s a little bit of marketing. a lot of photography. a little bit of graphic design. a little bit of writing and blogging. and we totally work together – me and the hubs. we are amazed at the freelance projects that keep pouring in. completely amazed. totally blessed. i’m about to take a leap of faith with some of our business stuff and i’m skeered out of my mind! {steven’s cool as a cucumber.}
anyways, that’s a very unglamorous shot of what we do. late at night, with diet cokes, with a candle burning, with a mac screen in front of us, with the kids all tucked in their beds asleep. working away into the night….and it’s kinda like one of my favorite things to do. with my favorite person.
8./ thrifting. i took the girls out with me to run some errands at aldi and target. on our way home we stopped into a consignment store to see if we could find some summer stuff. i needed a few specific things and i said a prayer before we walked in. you must know i’m a picky person. i like foreign looking things on my kids and i wish i could unrealistically order from europe for them. but i got to thinking about how we live in america. how we have so much...extra…here. enough to have resale shops with beautiful hand-me-downs and targets with clearance clothes. and i got goosebumps. because i feel so blessed/convicted to be able to buy things for my children. things that are way more than we deserve. things that are a little impractical and a lot pretty. and we got back in the car and i stopped for a second and told the girls we needed to pray. we needed to thank Jesus that we just got to do that. because we don’t deserve it. and He is waay too good to us.
9./ dinner. i always love taking a break from life to just cook in the kitchen. the kids were asleep and i got out my cutting board and began chopping and grating. it’s a therapeutic thing for me. being in the best spot in the house. i asked steven to come sit with me and eat. we poured our glasses and caught up for a minute. on life. on work.
and to me. that’s the best way to live. talking over good food with the people you love.
maybe i’m an old soul…i don’t know.
are you an old soul? do you heart weekends too? with your family? with a good book? with a good tv series? i’d love to hear about it. please link up your own weekend story below. i just ask that you please link back to annapolis and company {with a text link, or a button below} and take a minute to visit someone else and say hello. it’s such a community here…so let’s spread the love!
