Pastor Buddy’s Blog

A tribute to my Oklahoma lady…

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Journal,

Got to reach back a ways to the first time when I looked into those beautiful blue eyes of my Oklahoma lady. Course you may not believe this but my toes actually began to curl the first time I took a deep looksee into her eyes. Now that’s the plain truth as near as I can remember it. But I don’t want to start off with the toe-curling experience. (Think I may have shared a bit of this awhile back. Don’t make no matter. It’s worth the sharing again.)

Yup, the first time I actually seen my sweet Betty was in a Pentecostal Church in western Colorado. I had me a cousin who insisted on dragging me to church with her. She figured I was pretty much a reprobate that needed saving. So to get her off my back, I went to church with nothing but reluctance as my side kick. 

Weren’t a whole lot of people there. However, I couldn’t help but notice this young thing that was a pretty as bluebonnet flowers that grow wild on the road sides in Texas. When I saw her sitting by a feller, I figured right away it must have been her husband or her beau. Being the natural gentleman that I am, I simply reverted my eyes elsewhere.

But a picture of that light brown-haired beautiful lass didn’t plan on leaving so quietly nor quickly. She just sort of lingered around on my mind. Don’t think I’d ever seen such a beautiful thing in all my born days. Don’t know why I couldn’t get her off my mind. (The Lord knew. He knows everything.)

Well, wouldn’t you know it — Here I am in front of the trailer where we were temporarily living when this here car drives up. Out steps a very tall gentleman, and right behind him is that brown haired lass with eyes the color of bluebonnet flowers in Texas. My heart flipped. I tried not to stare at those eyes and I was ever so glad that she could not see my toes. But I just couldn’t help myself. And that my friend was my first toe-curling experience. Happens all the time ever since.  :)

Well, come to find out this tall man was her daddy, and the feller she was sitting by in church weren’t her beau at all. It was her brother. That did it — All bets were off.

I don’t even remember why her daddy came by cept perhaps to see about getting me in church. Nothing else entered my mind cept this lass. And naturally being the spiritual man that I was, going to church would never again be a problem. From that moment on I had me a good reason for being in church. Been there ever since.

This all happened in June, 1963. Me and my Betty began seeing one another on a regular basis. On our first date I took her to a circus. And come September 9, 1963, me and the girl from Colorado got hitched. Colorado? Where does Oklahoma come into the picture.

This is the part I dearly love. Found out that my sweet lady was originally from Oklahoma. Not that I got me nothing against Colorado, cept I really didn’t much care about living there. Got too much southern in me. The Coloradians were not southern enough.

But Oklahoma — Now that’s a different story. I’ve always felt like Oklahoma belonged to the deep south. Some of this comes from my country music upbringing where the Oklahoma Hills song was popular with we guitar and fiddle players.

In fact there was one of the songs that I dearly loved from childhood. ’Oklahoma Hills,’ was written by Woody and Jack Guthrie. Take a listen to it:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=AWCyy4YNUVc

For you who have a hard time following the lyrics, here’s the words ….

Oklahoma Hills
Words and Music by Woody Guthrie and Jack Guthrie

Many a month has come and gone
Since I’ve wandered from my home
In those Oklahoma hills
Where I was born

Many a page of my life has turned
Many lessons I have learned
And I feel like in those hills
Where I belong

CHORUS:
Way down yonder in the Indian nation
Ridin’ my pony on the reservation
In the Oklahoma hills where I was born

Way down yonder in the Indian nation
A cowboy’s life is my occupation
In the Oklahoma Hills where I was born

But as I sit here today
Many mile’s I am away
From the place I rode my pony
Through the draw

Where the oak and black-jack trees
Kiss the playful prairie breeze
And I feel back in those hills
Where I belong

CHORUS

Now as I turn life a page
To the land of the great Osage
In those Oklahoma hills
Where I was born

Where the black oil rolls and flows
And the snow white cotton grows
And I feel like in those hills
Where I belong

Begin to find out more and more about my pretty Oklahoma lass. Found that she had a good dose of Indian lineage in her, Choctaw to be exact. You don’t see it as much in Betty as you do in her mom and her sister Lareta. Also met her great uncles. Are they ever Indian. I figured right then that it would be good to sleep with one eye open. (For the sake of my hair.) Just kidding.    :)

Here’s a treat if you don’t mind sitting back for a looksee and a listen. It is another wonderful rendition of Oklahoma Hills. Enjoy the scenery:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=ttFJw_me43M

Well, now I know why I loved the Oklahoma Hills song since childhood. It comes back to what I said earlier, “The Lord knew. He knows everything.”

You see, the story would not be complete if I failed to give you the Lord’s side in all this. According to an ancient Jewish tradition, the Lord is also known as the ‘Great Shadchan.’ (Marriage maker.) There is a bit of Jewish culture behind this.

In every Jewish community you had a shadchan. It could be a man or a woman. The shadcan’s job was to study the children, study the families, gather whatever other information was valuable, and then recommend which child should be married to which child. Out of this tradition came a rabbinic teaching that God spends much of His time in heaven determining who will marry whom.

Well, naturally I believe that. There is no question in my mind that that beautiful blue-eyed Oklahoma lass, who was born May 27, 1943, was heavenly arranged to be married to a Louisiana lad, who was born August 21, 1940. 

Now that we traveled the journey of life together for 44+ years, I not only believe that the Lord arranged for our lives to become one, I know it in the deep in my being.

Maybe ’knowing this’ is why I had to grab Betty and run. Yup, we eloped. Better leave that story alone for the sake of family goodness. And in time we ran all the way from Colorado to my wonderful homeland in Central Louisiana.

Betty is a true Louisianian now. She has lived here for forty-two of our forty-four years of marriage. And she can cook equal to any cajun in this country.

Guess I need to close things down a bit. Let me share just one more story from our early getting-to-know-you days. Betty’s daddy was a preacher. I loved him dearly. But Betty had pretty much made up her mind that she did not want to be a preacher’s wife. Brings me back to ‘The Lord knew. He knows everything.’

Over my many years of walking with the Lord there is one thing I have found out about Him. The Lord has a wonderful sense of humor. What Betty wanted and what the Lord wanted did not mesh together. She ended up with a preacher.

All my kids have ever known is that mama married a preacher. When Nathan was born I had already acknowledge my call to the gospel ministry. Yep, having a preacher papa is all my  children have ever known. We will just have to keep my reprobate days a secret.

Time to stop before I write a documentary on the loviest lady that world has ever known. (Course beauty just naturally runs in my family.)

Much love,

Buddy