Sunday morning I was wanting to get out of the house so I enlisted son Logan to go with me to Oxley Nature Center for a hike. I ran a trail race the previous day so I didn’t want anything that that had hills or rocks, just some nice flat trails through the woods.
And some nice skies and open prairie.
We came across some art installations using marigiold blooms. “The American Dream” by Sarah Ahmad. We only saw a few the installations. It was very muddy and the mosquitoes were out in force so we left after just a couple miles.
An American Dream is part of the Greenwood Art Project which was part of the commemoration of the 100th Anniversary of the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921 where a white mob, many of the deputized by law enforcement, burned the mainly black Tulsa neighborhood of Greenwood, to the ground, killing several hundred residents while doing so. There is lots of places to learn about the event and aftermath, the History Channel has a really good summary.
The story of the Massacre and the aftermath, and the ongoing injustice, is so big, outrageous, and so complicated that I can’t really deal with it except by looking at small parts of it at a time.
The installations all have a Biblical theme apparently. I am not the Bible scholar that I should be so I didn’t catch the references. This installation nestled in the plants at the edge of a lake brings to mine the story of baby Moses in the reeds as told in the Book of Exodus.
In addition to the art, Oxley still has its timeless beauty. It doesn’t get as many visitors as other places in town, which is fine by me.
I plan to make it back to see the other pieces in the installation, if the rains hold off.
Later on Sunday, Heather and I went to visit one of our favorite breweries and I snapped this photo of a big cloud to the south.
Scared me so much I took Heather’s beer as well as mine. I kind of like this photo. Makes me look skinny, kind of, and it doesn’t show all my double and triple chins. You don’t need to tell me to slow down on the beer drinking and all those chins would go away on their own, I already know that.
And still later, we had a nice sunset and I launched the drone. I have a watch that tells me when sunset is and so I go out and check the sky and if it looks promising I put the drone back together and launch it. I’m still at a max of a hundred meters. We are in the flight path of the Tulsa Airport and the FAA will only let me get up to 150 meters. It’s amazing cuz they are not on the honor system. My drone’s electronics will physically not let the drone exceed that height.
When Joe Biden came to Tulsa a few days ago to speak about the Massacre, the FAA grounded everything all day long. My drone would not get off the ground. I think it is sad that they have to do that but all it takes is one bozo who don’t think the rules apply to them and a tragedy may occur.
Oh well, this is all I have for Skywatch this week folks. Everybody please be safe!!