#34 of 52 : AUNT CATHLEEN AND MOTHER

External Photo Clues:
None

Imagine:
It slipped from Aunt Cathleen’s Bible, fluttering delicately to the old rose rug – it was her favorite back in the day.   I just stared…the picture was very familiar…OK…I remember…Oh yes, I remember….

Auntie Cathleen was livid.  The hatred in her stare, her long gloved fingers clutched in such tight fist.  Cold chills run up my arms and I actually shivered thinking back.  She had refused to even look at the camera…Yep she was ready to fight.

She had come to take me away, again….She being my Mother and on her fifth marriage. This one like the others was “the one”….”her prince charming”….  If I had known about such things back then I would have said, “Mother you don’t have to get married just to have sex…”  Whoa, what an uproar that would have caused. In 1939 that would have been sacrilegious words.  You did not know your mate in the intimate manner until you were married.  Now-a-day couples do…as my Auntie Cathleen would say it, “sleep together” before the wedding night.

I turned 79 years old today and I believe I have arrived at the age where I can say the things out loud that I only use to think…That’s one of the perks of getting old and senile. I can now say it and no one is really shocked.  Oh, they pretend they are but most of the time their glad someone just come out and said it. Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 34 →

#33 of 52 : OLIVIA AND PAPA

External Photo Clues:
None

A Note From Quentin:
This story was written over 25 years ago by a Grandfather, about a Granddaughter.  In April 2011 the Grandfather passed away, and the Granddaughter received the story as a gift.  This story was slightly modified by the Granddaughter, and the image selected for it, for The 2011 Imaginary Family Project.  Enjoy!

Imagine:
She has always been my favorite grandchild. Her smile can turn the worst of days into precious moments you never want to end. Ever since Olivia was two years old, her uniqueness has been apparent in her selflessness that is unmatched by any other I have ever known.

In rare occurrences, Bernadette might have known of Olivia’s existence. It is hard to say. Olivia, however, is quite aware of Bernadette, even though the two have never met and never will. For Olivia, Bernadette is an image of unknown quality known as great-grandmommy, a person who exists for her mainly because of Nani’s sadness. Bernadette is ninety-two; Olivia is six; and Nani is Claire: Bernadette’s daughter, Olivia’s grandmother, and my wife.

Claire is sad because her mother, Bernadette, has entered into the final stages of Alzheimer’s disease, and I am telling this story because I am struck by the natural empathy of a little girl who has not yet learned to harden her heart in an attempt to cope with an imperfect world. Hopefully, she will never learn. Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 33 →

#32 of 52 : VELMA AND PAUL

External Photo Clues:
None

Imagine:
   It all started on Thanksgiving Day that winter the lake froze solid.  All the family had gathered, some travelling in from Kansas, others just from the next county.  It was a standard family affair wonderfully complete with too much food and twice as many children as the year before.  The women cooked and giggled, and the men smoked outside and talked about politics, crops, and religion.  Everyone was generally too busy to notice that a romance was budding between two young people.

When she first saw him, he had been looking at her intently, trying to figure out her age.  Some vague impression told him she was about two years his junior.  Even the girls in his class at school were not so grown, not nearly so womanly.  Yet here she stood, wearing perfume and lipstick, chestnut hair let down in smooth curls and parted on the side instead of yanked back in the standard girlish ponytail.  Once he was caught staring, hot color flooded his cheeks. Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 32 →

#31 of 52 : BERNICE

External Photo Clues:
None

Imagine:
“I wasn’t saluting. I was pushing the hat out of my eyes.”

We aren’t surprised to hear this from our mother. Whenever we find old pictures she has to correct the ideas she imagines developing in our heads.

In the wedding album: “I wasn’t smiling about getting married. I was laughing at your father for spilling wine on his shoes.”

With infant versions of us: “I wasn’t posing for a picture. I was asleep on my feet, thanks to you, and the flash startled me awake.”

In any photo in which she is touching us: “Somebody had to wipe the crud off of you.”

We are sixteen and fourteen when we find it, and mom claims to be fifteen in this picture. It seems impossible that she’s not just playing dress-up. But she lied about her age to follow her husband who’d shipped out a week after they’d eloped. We feel as if we want to protect this girl, sandwiched between our ages. Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 31 →

#30 of 52 : ALEX AND VICTORIA RAND

External Photo Clues:
None

Imagine:
    As Alex and Victoria Rand looked back on their married lives for the last fifty years as Oklahomans, they could see that God had blessed them. They had three healthy children and were certainly proud to be Oklahomans.

Both Alex and Victoria were descendents from hard workers on each side of the family. They were both from  very large families in Burneyville, Oklahoma. They knew how to share things and to be frugal. Alex and Victoria gave new meaning to the term, “survivors of the fittest.”

Victoria could remember having her own “tow sack” to pull cotton alongside her mother and father and seven siblings. On one occasion, she could remember pulling bolls with snow on the ground. She could remember picking up pecans with her back to the wind and building a fire to keep warm underneath the pecan trees in Southern Oklahoma. Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 30 →

#29 of 52 : THE OUTLAW

External Photo Clues:
None

Imagine:
After she died, my grandfather took this and every photo of her and put them in a drawer, and my mother and I moved back to the farm.

He didn’t talk to me much.  He didn’t talk at all, really, except to say, “Pass the ham,” or “Stop fussing, Delores,” when my mother tried to cut his meat or set out his pills.  I chewed my own dinner and watched them negotiate these new boundaries.

Sometimes I walked behind him as he plowed, kicking the dirt with my sneakers.  Sometimes he would say to me, “Good thing you’re here, son.  Now you can learn how to be a man.”  I was seven and had never realized that being a man was something that required study. Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 29 →

#28 of 52 : GRACE AND SAM

External Photo Clues:
None

Imagine:
It wasn’t like her to be sentimental. Aching memories of joy seemed like such a waste of time, like blooming flowers at a funeral. Out of place and unwanted amidst so much sorrow. I mean really, would it ever bring your loved ones back? Did they really ever ease the heartache?

Indulging in these fleeting moments had lasting repercussions, but every once in a while, a memory blindsided her – every sight , every sound, every inch of her being was assaulted with that horrible stench of nostalgia.

“Hmmm… I thought I had gotten rid of him,” she said casually to the photograph on the floor. “We were a handsome couple. No denying that. Shame we couldn’t make a go of it.”

Even though she was alone, she felt compelled to keep her outward appearance strong and unaffected. But inside, inside she began the mourning process all over again, as if it had happened yesterday and not eight years ago. Her heart began to palpitate, engaging in that battle she had all too often when he entered her life. The storyline was always the same, smiles and laughter co-mingled with crashing cameos of betrayal and pain. Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 28 →

#26 of 52 : WHEAT

External Photo Clues:
Handwritten on the back : “1924”

Imagine:
Pass me my magnifier Merle. My eyes have taken up with the cataracts and I don’t see so well. Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 26 →

#25 of 52 : UNCLE FRANKIE

External Photo Clues:
None

Imagine:
After selecting a picture for the Imaginary Family Project, I decided to post an ad at an online genealogy web site to see if anyone recognized the photo.   Much to my surprise I received a reply after only a few days.  Maryanne Ponder, from right here in Oklahoma City, emailed me, saying that she thought the little boy in the tree was her husband’s Uncle Frankie.  I asked to meet Mr. Ponder and she readily agreed, inviting me to their home.  The following is a rough, phonetic where appropriate, transcription of the interview that resulted:

Michael (“M”):  Thanks for meeting me.

Johnny Ponder (“JP”):  No problem.  It was a trip to see that picture.

M:  You recognized the photo right away?

JP:  Yeah.  I saw it and said to myself, “ah man, that’s Uncle Frankie!!” Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 25 →

#24 of 52 : CINDY

External Photo Clues:
None

Imagine:
The man eases me against the curb in front of a house the color of red mud.  About ten inches out; just right, and he corners the tires.  He’s a pretty good driver — way better than my last owner, who never remembered to shift and always scraped the curb.  New neighborhood, I think — no trees, and the road’s still smooth.  Hot though; the tar feels a little squishy against my tires.  No sign of a garage; at least there’s a driveway.

A boy and a girl come pounding out the door of the house, followed by a woman in a housedress.  The woman’s tall and thin; she looks a little worn.  No surprise — the girl looks to be maybe 8 and the boy might be 11, and that combination would tire anyone out.

The man opens my door and gets out.  He closes it gently but firmly.  No slamming. Another good sign.  He spreads his arms wide.  “Ta DAH!”

The boy jumps up and down.  “A new car!  Is it ours?  Can we keep it?  COOOOL.  How fast will it go?”  Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 24 →

#23 of 52 : FATHER

External Photo Clues:
None

Imagine:

My father had grown up the son of a farmer in a small village called Svetlitsy, in the northern part of the Ukraine.  He had immigrated to his new home in the states as a young teenager, along with his Mother and two older sisters.  The years had either made his memory foggy, or the old man just refused to talk about his past, as I never really knew what the circumstances were that caused my father to leave the Ukraine without his own father.  I never met my paternal grandmother.  From the stories my Mother told she had only met her a few times and she painted a very intimidating picture of a stocky brutish woman, that never allowed herself even the tiniest bit of happiness.  My father was a mystery, past and present. Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 23 →

#22 of 52 : KATHRYN JEAN SWEED

External Photo Clues:
Written in Pencil:
Kathryn Jean Sweed
Ellwood Park Amarillo Tex.
Summer July 1952

Imagine:

My mother didn’t die.  She just left for no reason at all.  I don’t remember any difference between the day she left and the day before.  My parents hadn’t argued.  She didn’t pack a single bag.  She didn’t even treat me or Lizzy Beth extra special like she should have done.  Lizzy Beth was riding on my back.  I could feel her drool dripping into my hair.  She was laughing hysterically as I neighed and whinnied and crawled around on my knees.  Lizzy Beth had just turned two.  I was twelve.  The last thing my mother said to us was, “I’m going out to get my hair curled, Sawyer. Y’all be good.”

That was it.  My mother just walked out of the house without us.  She took her purse.  She didn’t leave a note.  She just didn’t come back home again.  That evening when my dad got back from the Pantex Plant he changed out of his work clothes.  He’d drank two Budweiser beers and listened to two radio programs before he noticed she was not around.  In fact, it wasn’t until I was changing Lizzy in the middle of the family room that he asked about her.  “What’s your mother made for dinner?”

Lizzy Beth took that second of me being distracted and wriggled free from her diaper.  I chased her all over the place, while trying at the same time to explain that I hadn’t seen my mother for hours.  “She went to get her hair curled she said.  But she ain’t back yet.  I made sandwiches for my and Lizzy. You want one?” I asked. Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 22 →

#21 of 52 : FRANKIE JEAN

External Photo Clues:
None

Imagine:
By the time this photo was taken of my mother she had made up her mind. I can tell because she looks almost happy.

In this photograph—I found a bunch of them in a box in the garage with a yellow dress and an old, empty bottle of French perfume—she and my daddy are looking in different directions. They always were, but I guess in the inky womb of the club where they met, they couldn’t tell that yet. At 18, Mama hadn’t yet discovered the difference between a man’s big talk and a man’s real talk. The only reason he wasn’t a foreman at the factory, Daddy told her, was cause they wouldn’t let colored people or Indians be foremen but that didn’t mean he couldn’t do it. After all, he’d spent two years in Paris during the war, hadn’t he?

She’s never told me any of this, not in words. Not out loud. All I really know is that the yellow dress is the one she used to wear to the juke joints down on Freeman Highway. It was the kind of dress with a low sweetheart neckline and slim-fitting skirt that promised that the nice girl might not be quite as nice as you thought. Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 21 →

#20 of 52 : MARLA

External Photo Clues:
None

Imagine:
Marla sat in the tiny apartment on the second floor of a brick building so square that cockroaches couldn’t hide in the corner. Not that there were many cockroaches, since Burns Flat was dry and hot, and Marla was a meticulous housekeeper. “If you could call it housekeeping,” she thought to herself,  wiping red dust off the window sill. “Not much of a house to keep.” Sometimes, though, a roach or two moved in with a new family from the eastern part of the state. She wondered if the bugs, like her, wished they were back home. Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 20 →

#19 of 52 : LUELINDA ROGERS FLUORNOY

External Photo Clues:
None

Imagine:
Luelinda Rogers Fluornoy is shown here delivering the cake she made for Granny Wescomb’s 64th birthday party in Shidler, Oklahoma circa 1954. Leulinda’s boyfriend (and Daddy’s farmhand) Robert Ashcraft who chauffeured her here in her daddy’s truck, is off to the side as he didn’t feel he had come properly dressed for such a photo. He said he, ‘never dreamed they’d be a takin’ pictures and such…’

The Fluornoy’s ran a cattle ranch in Osage county for three generations. Luelinda was not keen on continuing her portion of the family ranching tradition but Robert and her daddy had been slowly making headway on her change of attitude.  Her older brothers continued ranching on their parcels and eventually one took part time work at the Pawhuska Post office. It was a solid family but not close knit.

Eventually her change of heart effected her change of attitude and she and Robert Fluornoy were married in the Fall of 1955 at grandma’s W’s house.  Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 19 →

#18 of 52 : JAY

External Photo Clues:
None

Imagine:
This is a picture we took of my son Jay while we were moving. I had taken a job in Oklahoma City, so we packed our things and moved Jay away from all his friends and favorite places. He was sullen for weeks before the move, and the day we left his mood had not improved, so we stopped here to cheer him up. We let him pretend he was the Jay after whom the restaurant was named, and the waitress was nice enough to play along with the charade. It cheered him up long enough to smile for this picture.

We moved in next door to George and Harriet Turner and their daughter, Mary, who was a year younger than Jay. My wife Lily always had a bad feeling about George, though I couldn’t for the life me understand why. Call it what you like, but she could always see things like that in people.

Jay and Mary became fast friends, and we grew close to the Turner family over the next few years. By the time our kids were in high school, it was obvious to everyone except Jay and Mary that they were falling in love. Kids always seem to ignore what’s right in front of their noses. But by the time Jay was a senior in high school, even he had realized that he was in love with his next-door neighbor and best friend. Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 18 →

#17 of 52 : MARY, SHELL, CINDY & FRANCES FOSTER (Frank Foster not pictured)

External Photo Clues:
None

Imagine:
My mama disappeared that summer. Funny thing about memory, sometimes I don’t know the difference between my own true recollection and things I’ve been told. Maybe that’s due partly to hearing bits and pieces of this story over and over again my whole life, from the time that photo was taken to this day. And now look at me. Sitting here telling the same story all over again. Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 17 →

#16 of 52 : ROBIN

External Photo Clues:
None

Imagine:
With all my moving across this wide open mid-western country for near sixty years one would think I’d have organized something about my life.  Every time I unload a moving truck into bedrooms and kitchens I am amazed at the boxes I’ve not opened since my last move. In the unused study the boxes rise against the wall. I’m not running from anything because I carry it with me, sealed in plastic cases and shoe boxes.

My last move five months ago landed me as a library assistant in a small town in Oklahoma bordered by miles of ranch land. All the major county roads are lined with fence posts and barbed wire, and the black cows are scattered alongside a creek snaking through a field almost barren of trees.  There’s something peaceful about gazing across flat land at a lone tree and a cloudless blue sky stretched like a blanket above my head.  And as I gaze for too long and become lost in my thoughts, the tree becomes a stranger staring back at me until I lose the contest, look away, awed by the ache of quiet.  Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 16 →

#15 of 52 : DAVEY

External Photo Clues:
None

Imagine:
That’s my cousin Davey.  We were about the same age and lived just a couple of miles from each other for most of our youth. We didn’t have any brothers or sisters and so were pretty close — as close as anyone could get to Davey, that is.  Davey was a Cub Scout.  Always tryin’ to do good.  At least that’s how it seemed.   As for me, I’d do right if the situation arose, but I didn’t go outta my way.  Still don’t.  

Anyway…that dog in the box?  Well, there’s no tellin’ what its name was cuz it was just one of several strays that Davey had a propensity for takin’ in.  By the time we were seventeen, I betcha he’d brought in about five different dogs that eventually died or drifted off again. Why, so many dogs used to come around that I figure they must’ve had some sort of signal between ’em, tellin’ each other where to go when things got tough.  I guess in that respect Davey’s nature wasn’t so unusual; a soft heart for strays, be they animal or human, well, you hear about that every now and again.  Continue reading The 2011 Imaginary Family Project – Week 15 →