a.d. elliott - Take the Back Roads

Dear Henry, While I was growing up, one of my favorite things to do was to see Temple Square's Christmas lights in Salt Lake City, but it has been years since I've seen another place that compares with the number of lights that the Mormon church puts together.  At least until we came to Tulsa and saw the Rhema Bible Training College Christmas lights. The Rhema Bible Training College is a Charismatic Christian school founded by Kenneth Erwin Hagin in 1974.  Kenneth Hagin had been a long-time evangelical preacher who had discovered his calling after being miraculously healed of a heart defect and blood disease while a teenager. However, he would remain paralyzed throughout his life. Finally, inspired by Mark 11:23-24, he began preaching in the late 1930s and eventually joined the Voice of Healing Revival with other Christian ministers such as Oral Roberts and Gordon Linsey.  Mr. Hagin was further inspired to create a Christmas event to "show that Jesus is the light of the w...

Dear Henry, It's amazing what you can find on the side of the road.   Recently, we stopped by Ed Galloway's Totem Pole Park located in Foyil, Oklahoma, and it was definitely worth pulling over for. After US Army veteran Nathan Edward Galloway  (full biography here ) retired from teaching in 1937, he moved to Foyil and pursued his first love, art. A self-taught sculptor, he built a workshop on his farm and began carving trinkets, wall art, and violins. He also began building totem poles for "something to do." The site's central, largest, and most well-known totem pole was constructed on a large sandstone that sat next to his home. He carved the stone into a turtle and built a 90-foot cement and wood tower. Next, taking inspiration from Native American imagery, he cut nine levels of birds in bas-relief style, which he then brightly painted. The construction of this totem pole took 11 years, and the inside is painted with landscapes.  Other intricately carved and bri...

Dear Henry, It's not a secret that I have struggled to find a "place" here in Tulsa. Not that there is anything wrong with the city, it has a fantastic history and architecture, it's just that it's loud, with a lot of traffic and I haven't been able to get comfortable here. I have been amazed by how disconnected I have felt with the area and, as I came from a small parish in Northwest Arkansas to the larger parishes of the Broken Arrow/Tulsa area, I felt adrift disjoined at church.   Even finding peace at St. Scholastica's, my closest adoration chapel (think a mediation room with the Divine Presence), has been challenging and awkward. The first time I came to the chapel, I set off the building's alarm. I managed to return to St Scholastica's after the alarm incident,  and, after several visits that were plagued by always finding a wobbly kneeler that clatters on the floor of the sanctuary every time I take a breath, I was reminded of one of my life...

Dear Henry, It isn't a secret that I look at the world a little darkly and that I love "scary" fairy tale shows such as the Addams family and Pan's Labyrinth. In fact, I think I've had The Nightmare Before Christmas on repeat since October 1. I'm usually able to keep my inner Lily Munster suppressed but not this year. The Oklahoma (and really any of the plains) landscape can be austere, particularly in the winter and much of the beauty of the place comes from the colors of the sky, the pastoral nature of the landscape, and the isolation of individual subjects. The landscape outside of Tulsa, near Osage Hills, has a very stark and gothic beauty and I felt like some of the isolated ranches that one finds peppered throughout the hills, semi-hidden behind wrought iron fences, would be the perfect winter home for Morticia Addams. My goal when I took this photo was to capture the perfect "Oklahoma Winter" picture and I did, really.  This is a photo of Osag...

Dear Henry, Do you have any off-the-wall superstitions?   One of mine is the inability to walk away from coins on the side of the road. Even if that coin is only a penny. I am convinced that to leave the pennies where they lie is to affront the universe's powers that put opportunities for wealth and abundance in our path. Of course, my children think I'm weird, and I suspect that this superstition may make its way into a committee hearing later.  Despite their mockery, since we've moved to Tulsa, it's become quite the lucrative side gig. Because of the move and the restricted space in our apartment, I've spent more time walking the dog than ever before. Because we are no longer walking along isolated paths within rural Northwest Arkansas but rather city streets, I've been picking up several coins daily. My daily haul has turned into a running joke with Fish, and I'm currently earning, on average, about .05 a day.  Of course, that is just a typical day. There...