If you are an Oklahoman you would have to be living under a rock to not know just how important water is to our state. Turn on a TV and you can’t avoid being barraged by commercials claiming ownership of our valuable water supplies.
But amidst all the arguing about who owns what, another success story is emerging. Oklahoma can now claim more improvement in our water quality than any state in the nation.
In this week’s On the Horizon video blog, we focus on water quality in Oklahoma and meet some of the people who have made our success stories possible. To see more Oklahoma water success stories tune in Sunday at 3pm on OETA or visit us at okhorizon.com.
Rob
Oklahoma’s rank nationally for the percentage of its residents who report engaging in no leisure-time physical activity at all, 31 percent of adults in 2010
Gov. Mary Fallin, one of the most adamant supporters of this bill, insists on her official website that, as governor, she will create ‘a system where good teachers and good schools are rewarded.’ My school is not just good, Gov. Fallin, it is excellent. Please start treating it as such.
In all of the major income tax proposals this year (including the plan announced yesterday by Senate Republicans), the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) has been targeted for elimination. That’s strange, because lawmakers have made no clear argument for why we should lose this credit. They’ve spoken about the need to end handouts to “corporate special-interests,” but the EITC goes to low-income working families. It’s also strange because the EITC has a long history of support from conservative leaders. So why are Oklahoma lawmakers proposing to end it? {click here to continue reading this post}
This is me, playing with a hulahoop in Walgreens the evening after I finished my last doctoral coursework assignment a couple of weeks ago.
Letter to the RDC Community:
When I started the Red Dirt Chronicles two years ago, I had one primary purpose in mind: to develop a project that was positive and honest that highlighted snapshots of Oklahoma culture. Two years later, I think that has been done… to the degree that someone can who has the help and support of very special contributors and about 20 hours per week to donate to a project.
That same 20 hours per week was dedicated for five years prior to the start of the RDC in a different way. I worked with the Oklahoma Association for Marriage and Family Therapy in the capacity of President Elect and President, helping to run the volunteer organization and promote the profession of Marriage and Family Therapy within the state and the nation through advocacy.
Now, however, I’m going to be working on a different project very soon that will again take about 20 hours per week, and as the title of the Diane Keaton and Jack Nicholson film says, “Something’s Gotta Give.” I’ve completed my doctoral coursework required for my particular degree program over the past four years and it is now time to begin my dissertation. And while working on coursework can be a bear, it’s also cyclical. It ebbs and flows along with the required reading and assignments. My upcoming dissertation work, however, will not. It will be a slow and steady work until the final page is written. And, will take approximately…? You guessed it: 20 hours per week.
I cannot create time that doesn’t exist any more than I can ask reality to change into fiction for my life. After thinking over solutions for approximately two months prior to today, I’ve decided that if I’m going to complete my academic and professional goal of writing my dissertation, then I cannot continue to manage the RDC. The reason I know this is that if there is an academic deadline and a RDC deadline, I’ll choose the RDC every single time. I love it too much and I care about the RDC community too much. And what THAT means is, my work on this project could keep me from completing my dissertation work. It’s that simple…and I know myself too well to think that I would do things differently. I’m 48 so I’ve had a while to get to know myself. I love to work on this project, and would choose it almost every time – pushing back my dissertation and slowing down that work until I timed out all my extensions.
Therefore, I’m writing this post to let you know that very soon we may be having a “difference” here on the RDC. I’m not sure what that will be – it could be that someone else will take it over. It could be that I will “suspend” it for a while. Or, it could be that posts will slow down or it will become a single contributor project. But “something will give” and it will happen soon. And, we’ll let you know as soon as we know what that will be.
This is Mother’s Weekend. I’m pausing my new series on addiction to write for Mother’s Day. I have gone to The Source . . . Mom. I called my parents phone number in Apache, a very familiar number; it’s been their number for 50 years.
Saturday morning, 7:30am.
Me: Hi Mom, how are you this morning?
That's My Mom
Mom: Oh, just getting around to help with a funeral dinner. (followed by a discussion of the community of Apache, friends, and small talk)
Me: Mom, I’m writing my Red Dirt Chronicles article for the weekend and I want to interview you, is that okay?
Mom: Um, well alright, if you need to.
Me: How long have you been a mom?
Mom: How old are you?
Me: 56
Mom: There ya go, I’ve been a mom for 56 years and 10 days.
Me: How many kids do you have?
Mom: Three.
Me: So, what’s the big deal about being a mom, I mean, what is the blessing?
Mom: Oh wow, there are so many. (pause) You know, I think the best part is just being ‘Momma’. When the kids are little they need you and depend on you. Getting to be Momma and take care of all the little things, that’s a blessing. Then, when your kids get older there’s just a lot of pride.
We had a gift waiting for us six months after we built our home. I’m so glad I discovered it serendipitously. To have known about the magnetic call of our back yard whippoorwill before the bird revealed itself would have been less magical and made the first time we heard the sound expected. The way our whippoorwill revealed itself, however, was to become the difference in an evening chorus of tree frogs and lingering day songs from the birds who were almost done for the evening.
When the human brains register a “difference,” the first notion is to test the new feedback out. “Did you hear that?” I asked Mick as we worked in the last hint of light, raking up twigs in our back yard?
“What? No, I didn’t hear anything,” he replied.
I heard it again, ever so slightly more pronounced. “THAT,” I said. “That sound. It’s a bird call I’ve not heard before.”
When rakes stop scratching and attention is completely directed toward the collection of incoming sounds, then the world changes. Here is exactly the sound we heard together after pausing that evening:
And, we are blessed to hear it every Spring around this time. All told, I’ve enjoyed eight years on our back porch listening to the call of the whippoorwill end the day. He comes into auditory range when it reaches the bottom of our hill around the creek. The beautiful sound grows more pronounced as the bird gradually moves along the treeline up the hill, passes across our back yard, and then continues on its path until it is out of range for our ears as it crests the top of the hill.
The process, in some ways, is like a one-hour long doppler effect. Barely there, and heard at different wavelengths than when in immediate proximity, then changing again as it goes away. The sound is beautiful, but the bird is by and large elusive. It stops singing if you approach the area where it rests. After all, WE are not the mate it is looking for.
But when she responds, and they mate somewhere outside the range of our eyes or ears, the result is one or two eggs that will eventually hatch into more birds with hauntingly beautiful voices. The sound is so powerful that some Native American lore states that when people die, the whippoorwill catches the soul as it leaves their body. Continue reading Lessons From The Whippoorwill→
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Showcasing Red Dirt culture ~ authored and managed by contributors with connections to the great state of Oklahoma.