Twelve
____________
Dry
Times
The entire 1930s
were difficult times for farmers. Farms were leased to sharecroppers from
January 1st through December 31st each year. Mother Nature had to provide the
rain to support the spring planting and continue with abundant showers in order
for the crops to thrive and grow. Very little rain fell in the ‘30s and
Oklahoma was becoming a ‘dust bowl’. I remember when the brown clouds would
fill the distant horizon and all of us havin’ to get inside, plug the exterior
doors, windows, and any other crevices with towels, paper, and even clothes
sometimes, whatever we could get our hands on in a jiffy. We had to keep as
much of that dusty ol’ dirt out of the house as possible.
The childhood days of 'once upon a time' faded
swiftly, replaced by the necessity of everyone helping, including Mary, with
the 4 am livestock feedings, irrigation ditch clearing, and everything else it
took to keep our heads above the rushing waters of life that were trying to
pull us under and extinguish our hopes and dreams.
We were on the move again to what was hopefully
a better farm. We heard it might have a bread bakin’ oven in its basement, but
once we got there we found out it didn’t have one.
The farm we moved to next was near Indianapolis,
a wee town between Clinton and Weatherford. It no longer exists. We moved on
December 31st, but the present tenants were not leaving that day. They were
having a New Year’s party that doubled as their farewell party, so we all slept
on the floor in a small bedroom off of their living room. Banjo and guitar
music played most of the night. This farm was called the Wally and Thelma Jones
place and it wasn’t very productive, but we didn’t know that when we moved
there.
Indianapolis was a small town in Custer County.
I remember Pa sayin’ he went with his Pa once to a blacksmith shop to get new
shoes for their horse. The Great Depression slowly dismantled the town’s spirit
and resources and people moved away. There ain’t much there nowadays except
what’s left of an old grain elevator and a few old dwellings.
Custer County was founded in 1892 out of a
Cheyenne-Arapaho Indian Reservation. The county's name honored United States
Army cavalry commander George Armstrong Custer. The Indians defeated and killed
him and his soldiers in 1876 during the Battle of the Little Bighorn. Crazy
Horse, Sitting Bull, Medicine Cloud, Two Moons, and a whole bunch of other
famous Indians fought in that battle. We learned about it all in school.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
“A storm is brewin’!” Pa yelled. “We need to
secure everything we can… quickly.”
The charcoal-gray color of the atmosphere
enveloped the farm like a dense fog on a fall evening. The sky appeared far
away, out of reach, as though it had ascended to a much higher altitude than
usual. This was no dust storm. The feelings that this night produced were both
mystical and surreal. There was a peculiar silence, a calm that was unnerving.
It was not a particularly cold night, but an eerie feeling of uncertainty that
surrounded this rare electrical storm seemed to have a chilling effect upon
everyone.
“Help!” Rae Ann’s scream echoed through the
raging winds as a faint cry.
Richard and Teddy ran as fast as their legs
allowed. A large snake was curled up in front of their sister, but slithered
away into a hole at the corner of the house when the two boys ran up upon it.
“C’mon, sis,” Richard commanded, “we’ve got to
hurry.”
“What about the snake?” his fearful sister
questioned.
Teddy spoke up abruptly, “Never mind that now,
we’ll tell Pa about it. Let’s get us a move on.”
Over the years the Charltons had spent many a
night sitting out under the peaceful canopy of stars that gracefully stretch
across the heavens like a comforting blanket, but this night felt very unusual
for some reason. The lightning flashes that rippled across the sky seemed to
echo some sense of overwhelming power; a visible voice that came as a reminder
that this planet is only a tiny speck of dust lodged in an incredibly vast
universe; a universe that is but a pebble in the palm of God’s powerful hand.
Running up to her father, Rae Ann asked, “Ya
think it’s one of them twisters, Pa?”
“Naw, well… I sure hope it ain’t. It’s too dark
for me to tell right now.”
This answer did not calm Rae Ann at all, but
rather increased her anxiety. She had never observed a storm as intense as this
before.
The jagged bolts of glaring light that scattered
themselves across the entire atmosphere appeared as graceful whispers upon the
sky, whispers with the awesome power to destroy the noblest of trees. Red,
blue, yellow, and varying shades of each could be seen reflecting across the
cloud canopy.
The family returned to the house and gathered in
the living room while the Charlton parents tried to calm three of their
children. Richard was unfazed by the storm and seemed to be enjoying its
surrealistic beauty. He remembered something Christ Jesus once said, ‘For as
the lightning that flashes out of one part under heaven shines to the other
part under heaven, so also the Son of Man will be in His day’. What a
wonderful sight that will be, he
thought, the long awaited return of the world’s Savior.
A crackle announced the destruction of a large
tree a stone’s throw away from the barn, but no fire erupted from it. Large
jagged balls of hail fell for almost a minute breaking two of the house
windows. John Charlton was very happy he had parked their automobile and
tractor inside of the barn as he usually did; sometimes he neglected to move
his vehicles into the barn in the late evenings, especially during harvest season.
“That was so close,” Rae Ann commented.
The tranquility of this night’s show of light
was soon to end. No sooner than the storm had begun its fierce rage, it
subsided.
Richard’s excitement overwhelmed him, “That was
awesome!” The memory of this natural scene of electrical force would remain
etched upon Richard’s mind like an ancient petroglyph carved into stone until
that day when his own short vapor of life on earth would end.
The rest of the family did not completely share
in his joyous outlook of the events that had transpired.
As the sky lightened in color, a crimson and
yellow glow appeared to the east.
“Well,” Mr. Charlton said, “Looks like the worst
has passed. C’mon boys, we need to be checkin’ on the livestock before we get
to bed. You two girls can help your Ma if she be needin’ any. And watch out for
broken glass.”
In the morning, while a gentle breeze rustled
the nearby trees, Richard listened intently out of his bedroom window to the
sound of birds singing. He felt that their songs were sung in gratitude for
another day of precious life on the earth.
“Boys,” John Charlton entered the bedroom his
two sons shared, “let’s get a move on. We need to clear that tree that got hit
by the lightning before I drive you to school. At least as much as we can.”
Teddy grumbled at the thought, but Richard had
an inner peace, a special feeling in his heart and mind, one of tranquility.
Richard calmly said, “Comin’ Pa.”
Rae Ann and Mary walked to school after
breakfast while their father and brothers went about the task of cutting down
what remained of the large half-scorched elm tree. Later that morning Mr.
Charlton drove the boys into town to the school. Many of the school children
were absent that day; presumably helping their parents deal with the effects of
the previous night’s lightning storm.
The farm was a very dry place and the Charlton
family struggled, to no avail, to grow produce.
“I be thinkin’ that even cactus wouldn’t grow
here,” John Charlton complained to one of the local feed store owners.
“You got that right, mister.”
“I’m not sure what we are gonna do. One can only
absorb so much hardship before they be a thinkin’ it may be high time to move
on. But the question is,” John looked around the feed store slowly, “where?
Where’s a soul to go in times like these?”
The store’s owner could only shake his head and share his
customer’s feeling of anguish, disappointment, and the innate desire not to be
defeated by the only way of life they each knew so well.
Original drawing by Erlend
Evensen of Kristiansand, Norway
Studies: The Royal Academy of Fine Arts
in The Hague
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