Gathering my senses

I like to stay at home when the world is Poppin'.  It’s different staying at home on a weekday when everybody else is at work.  Being nice and cozy in your house whether you’re cleaning it or just watching Netflix.  Sometimes it’s nice just to get away to relax, to think a little... to prioritize. Gather my wits and pay attention to my senses.  And sometimes it provides a good day to make potato soup in the crock pot.❥

Hear me roar bitches!

I am not a "disgrace to women" because I don't support the women's march. I do not feel I am a "second class citizen" because I am a woman. I do not feel my voice is "not heard" because I am a woman. I do not feel I am not provided opportunities in this life or in America because I am a woman. I do not feel that I "don't have control of my body or choices" because I am a woman. I do not feel like I am " not respected or undermined" because I am a woman. I am not a "victim" because you say I am.

I AM a woman. 

I can make my own choices. 

I can speak and be heard. 

I can VOTE. 

I can work if I want. 

I control my body. 

I can defend myself. 

I can defend my family. 

There is nothing stopping me to do anything in this world but MYSELF. 

I do not blame my circumstances or problems on anything other than my own choices or even that sometimes in life, we don't always get what we want. I take responsibility for myself. 

I am a mother, a daughter, a wife, a sister, a friend. I am not held back in life but only by the walls I choose not to go over which is a personal choice. 

Quit blaming. 

Take responsibility. 

If you want to speak, do so. But do not expect for me, a woman, to take you seriously wearing a pink hat on your head and screaming profanities and bashing men. 

If you have beliefs, and speak to me in a kind matter, I will listen. But do not expect for me to change my beliefs to suit yours. Respect goes both ways. 

If you want to impress me, especially in regards to women, then speak on the real injustices and tragedies that affect women in foreign countries that do not have the opportunity or means to have their voices heard. 

Saudi Arabia, women can't drive, no rights and must always be covered. 

China and India, infantcide of baby girls. 

Afghanistan, unequal education rights. 

Democratic Republic of Congo, where rapes are brutal and women are left to die or HIV infected and left to care for children alone. 

Mali, where women can not escape the torture of genital mutilation. 

Pakistan, in tribal areas where women are gang raped to pay for men's crime. 

Guatemala, the impoverished female underclass of Guatemala faces domestic violence, rape and the second-highest rate of HIV/AIDS after sub-Saharan Africa. An epidemic of gruesome unsolved murders has left hundreds of women dead, some of their bodies left with hate messages. Or the 7 year old girls being sold or married off to 60 year old men, Or the millions of women sold and bought into sex trafficking. 

And that's just a few examples. 

So when women get together in AMERICA and whine they don't have equal rights and march in their clean clothes, after eating a hearty breakfast, and it's like a vacation away that they have paid for to get there...

This WOMAN does not support it.

When death is sudden or expected....

A  butterfly lights beside us like a sunbeam ...

    and for a brief moment it’s glory and beauty belong to our world,

                  but then it flies again,

      and though we wish it could have stayed....

          we feel lucky to have seen it.

My friend, Jerry

He was my favorite, thespian! He was the sweetest, kindest, most genuine person that I actually allowed to boss me around!  I never did a production that he wasn’t part of.  And who would want to.  To me he WAS the theatre. There was a small group of us.  Joyce and Rick, Charles, Penny, Vernon and Jerry.  This was my pack.  And the theatre was my happy place.  And I miss them all.

But Jerry.... he was my mentor! He was like a big brother to me even though I never really knew how old he was!  He was such an important person in my life for years while living in Guymon.  He gave me a place I felt like I belonged.  Gave me a creative place to go, and he was just .... supportive of me and my silliness.   In fact, I have been known to say that when I moved from Guymon, he was the person I missed the most!

He ran my lights and did the sound at every play I was in or directed.  He allowed me to be 3rd assistant director for The Sound of Music so I would understand how a musical worked.  He allowed me free creativity on all my shows and never questioned me on the crazy things I requested for my plays... like the time I wanted a disco ball in the middle of the stage for my production of beauty and the beast.... he just stopped what he was doing, looked at me and said:  'A What?"  Then added,  "I can't wait to see what you are going to do with that!"

We spent hours listening to great music like Mannheim Steam Rollers while building sets.  He nicknamed me 'Rave', and everyone in the theatre started to call me that.  I had never had a nick name before, and that alone was awesome!

I remember walking into the the vast opening of the empty theatre... rows of chairs and the huge stage with the heavy curtains in front of me.... and way up high towards the ceiling, I would see  two white legs... dangling from the cat walk.  I would get on to him for doing things like that when no one was there, but he just swatted at me like I was a gnat.

The first time I met him, I was on stage,... with lights in my face, looking out I could see nothing,  He was just a booming voice in the back of the theatre, probably sitting in the last row.  "BE STILL!"  Over the next 10 years of us in productions together he never had to tell me to be still again!  He made THAT impact on me!

He also threatened to bring his gun on more the one occasion and shoot me if I walked in front of his sound booth window again, and teased me about my costumes in Divorce Southern Style, saying it was like watching a fashion show at every performance.  He loved to talk to me ... LOUDLY, over the headsets and get on to me if I forgot to turn it on.  When I had a wreck in the alley hitting the only pole by the theatre, he said... well Rave...that was dumb... but! ... the show must go on!

He cast me as Truvy in Steel magnolias and when he came over to bring me the script I had stuffed two dish towels in my bra and he didn't even notice!   He dumped all my costumes in a 5 gallon bucket of blue paint and called me telling me I better hurry and come get them so I had time to clean them before opening night in less than 7 hours!

He spent hours perfecting my sets, building them as close to Penny's designs as possible.
When I directed the play GREASE in El Reno, I called him and asked if I could borrow the head mics, so he drove up to the city and brought them to me.  He was just such a sweet person.

He butt dialed me a couple months ago and I got so excited to see his name on my phone, but when I answered I heard the background noises.  I called him back, but he didn't answer.  I wish he would have.  I would have loved to have spoken to him one last time.

Guymon lost a great man that cared so much for his community, and I lost a special friend. 
"All the world is a stage and all the men and women merely players!" 
RIP Jerry!  You can break the 4th wall now and take your  final bow!