#20 of 52 : MARLA

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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

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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

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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)

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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:
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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 →