She was flying her flag that day because it would have been Ronald Reagan’s 99th birthday. She’d been in his presidential plane once, she said, and it was an all-business type of aircraft, nothing fancy, just desks and places for people to sit and make important decisions with the greatest president this country has ever elected. At first, she was just a voice, a faceless woman sitting in a booth behind mine in a diner on the South side of Tulsa a couple of weekends ago. Sarah Palin was over in Nashville that day, the woman explained, warming up the crowd for the redemption to begin. “The mid-term elections will set the stage,” she said. A male voice grunted in agreement. “They will tell the story.” I tuned out of the conversation at my table, which revolved around my niece’s flat tire, and tuned into the one at the next table instead. Americans aren’t going to take this Godlessness lying down, I learned. The word is coming true, and it’s a wonderful thing to witness, the book coming to life on behalf of the faithful at long last. According to her, today’s young people – particularly college students – don’t stand a chance. “The Jews go at ‘em from one side and the gays from another,” she said. Obama is to blame for most of this (I kind of sensed this was coming) because he’s a traitor. The Haiti shenanigans, for instance. “That’s just a bunch of feel-goodism,” she said (I agree with that, actually). “Nobody has the Christian conviction or courage to tell those people the truth, which is that so many of them died because they’re sinners.”
The waitress appeared just then to refill the coffee and see if we needed anything, so I asked her if she had any ketchup. “It’s right there,” she said, “right behind your sugar shaker.” I turned around at that point to look out to the parking lot and, in the process, to get a good look at the oracle in the next booth. She was much older than I’d imagined based on her voice. She had red hair and wore an ivory colored cardigan over a blue blouse. If she’d been introduced on a talk show as Reba McEntire’s mother I would not have questioned it.
The next morning my sister’s husband called the house from the hospital, where he had just finished making his morning rounds, to ask me if he wanted him to swing by and pick me up to go to church. I said no, although I regretted it that night, when he told me that the main topic of the sermon had been organizing a group to go to Uganda to protest that country’s truly savage intention to execute gay people and prosecute those who fail to notify the officials of anyone they know who may be a homo. The main problem, he explained that evening, is that they’re having a hard time figuring out how to get the visas they need to get into the country. I didn’t go to church with him not because I wasn’t interested, but because I was so comfy in the big chair, drinking coffee and reading the Sunday edition of the Tulsa World, which had put a picture on the front page of the house in the city that had consumed the most water in 2009. Along with the addresses and the names of the top 10 water wasters in the area, the article accompanying the photo quoted an engineer, who said that even though there is currently no shortage in Oklahoma, assuming there never will be is short sighted.
The waitress appeared just then to refill the coffee and see if we needed anything, so I asked her if she had any ketchup. “It’s right there,” she said, “right behind your sugar shaker.” I turned around at that point to look out to the parking lot and, in the process, to get a good look at the oracle in the next booth. She was much older than I’d imagined based on her voice. She had red hair and wore an ivory colored cardigan over a blue blouse. If she’d been introduced on a talk show as Reba McEntire’s mother I would not have questioned it.
The next morning my sister’s husband called the house from the hospital, where he had just finished making his morning rounds, to ask me if he wanted him to swing by and pick me up to go to church. I said no, although I regretted it that night, when he told me that the main topic of the sermon had been organizing a group to go to Uganda to protest that country’s truly savage intention to execute gay people and prosecute those who fail to notify the officials of anyone they know who may be a homo. The main problem, he explained that evening, is that they’re having a hard time figuring out how to get the visas they need to get into the country. I didn’t go to church with him not because I wasn’t interested, but because I was so comfy in the big chair, drinking coffee and reading the Sunday edition of the Tulsa World, which had put a picture on the front page of the house in the city that had consumed the most water in 2009. Along with the addresses and the names of the top 10 water wasters in the area, the article accompanying the photo quoted an engineer, who said that even though there is currently no shortage in Oklahoma, assuming there never will be is short sighted.
