Our time in Oklahoma

When Larry was in the military and came back from overseas, he was stationed in OK. I had moved to AZ with my parents while he was gone, so he flew into Phoenix. From there we drove to OK to rent a house by the base, as we weren't eligible for base housing. So we found a house to rent in Dill City, which is a very small village. I looked it up online and it’s still about the same size as when we lived there.

Then we went to OH to spend time with the rest of our family members for several weeks. I went to get my hair cut, and the beautician said she heard there was a tornado in Dill City. Back then the news wasn't as easy to get as it is now. We couldn’t find anything about a tornado and thought she was wrong,

When we arrived back to OK and turned onto the road that would take us to the house we rented, the entire street was flattened. I had never seen destruction from a tornado before. My first thought was, is this what we’ll find when we get to our rental? We drove further and found the house we rented was standing as were the others in that part of the town. The entire town was and still is less than 2 miles. (I googled it)

Back then Larry was young and healthy and was asked to pitch in to clean up the mess.

One thing I remember about living in OK, sirens went off a lot. One of our neighbors had a storm cellar and  we would head to it with the others and sit out the storms. And people were friendly and helpful.

Larry once cleaned out a septic system for the landlord for a bag of groceries. I learned to eat green beans from the garden planted by whoever lived there before us. Since we didn’t have much money, we never had soda. It was popcorn and Kool Aid. I still can’t drink Kool Aid!

When we rented the house, a man who lived in the town came to the door to greet us and tell tell us he’d check on the “matters and tatters” while we were gone. We learned to eat the food from the garden, and I learned to be less picky.

In the military you moved with the car pools. Next we moved to Cordell, then to Elk City before being shipped to Indiana. We had two Okie babies. Not much to do in OK back then. One TV station that had locals singing over and over "Gum Chum."

Dee