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My pregnancy was a slipping
back and forth between struggling to maintain my health and the sorrow to
know I was still facing the surgeon’s knife once more. Grandmother’s home
housed us and we struggled financially.
There was a loud Whomp,
thumping sound as the heavy old tree truck landed exactly in the place
where Rodney had planned for it to come down.. He couldn’t work a nine to
five job because I was partly down, his daughter in the wheel chair, and a
son in grade school. The only way he could take care of his family and
support us too was by picking up odd jobs. My help was not much but I
tagged along a lot of the time. The fear of him on his back, alone with a
heavy limb coming down on his head made me afraid. I couldn’t have done
anything but at least it would have been possible to call for help.
All the work with Rhonda
was paying off in subtle ways almost too invisible to see. The children
loved her, especially her cousin, Kemy. It was a joy to see the two
tearing down a hill, or running to the park with Kemy’s Pogo and Sienna,
tongue out of the corner of her mouth, loping along side them. Sienna was
a gorgeous red Irish Setter of distinctive origin, papers and all. Pogo
was a bit of fluff usually looking like a powder puff from the blow dry
her mistress had given her after a bath. The strength of character Kemy
was building in her caring for her disabled cousin came through many years
later when she became a mature, responsible, loving mother. And so the
stage was set. How many children would come under Rhonda’s learned skills
from a place higher than the common.
Presently, there was no way
of knowing this. We just went through the days, loving each other, the
children, our community, and even branched out a bit to our tribe.
In the shower I would hum
the tune of Michael Murphey’s lyrics to Wildfire and weep quietly while I
entreated my Higher Power, Jehovah, to please spare my life in the days to
come ahead.
Don’t make your trip to
Oklahoma City at the last minute, my doctor wisely told me. December 17,
could be in the middle of a blizzard. He knew of what he spoke and we fled
Ponca City just ahead of an ice storm to check into the Community Hospital
at Oklahoma City.
Artist: Michael Martin
Murphey Lyrics
Song: Wildfire Lyrics
She comes down from Yellow Mountain
On a dark, flat land she rides
On a pony she named Wildfire
With a whirlwind by her side
On a cold Nebraska night
Oh, they say she died one winter
When there came a killing frost
And the pony she named Wildfire
Busted down its stall
In a blizzard he was lost
She ran calling Wildfire |
