Date Night

Date Night In the Dark

Every healthy relationship relies on patience and trust at some point and Kat and I had ours put to the test with this month’s date night. This month date night, titled “The Helpless Baker,” found us turning up the heat in the kitchen and testing Kat’s patience. While she tried to remain calm, it was my job to put all my faith in her as she guided me. Here’s what happened. Our date nights come from a book that has us scratch off a square similar to a lotto scratcher. We are given a few hints about the date, details like an expected time commitment, possible cost and major restrictions. Once we scratch the box, we find out exactly what we’ll be getting up to. This month our date called for us to bake a pie. The catch was that the least experienced baker would be doing the baking – blindfolded.

Guess who the least experienced baker in our relationship is. Another catch is that Kat was only permitted to use three directional sentences during our date (more on that later.) First, because my mom’s birthday was coming up, we decided to bake a cake rather than a pie. I expressed a little concern about ruining my mom’s birthday cake because I was going to try to bake it blind, but Kat assured me everything would be fine.

“I can bake this cake blindfolded without help,” Kat assured me. (More on that later.) I’ll also mention that Kat’s parents were visiting from California, so our bumbling blind baking adventure played out a little bit like a baking show with a live studio audience. Mr. and Mrs. Jones were also able to capture some great photos of the experience. So, with our challenge set, I went to work looking for a suitable blindfold, and Kat went to work gathering the tools of the trade: mixing bowl, measuring cups, oil, eggs and whisk.

I got back to the kitchen, surveyed the materials to get a basic layout and donned my blindfold. I stood, with hands outstretched, groping for something as laughter rolled through the house. I wait. They laugh. I wait a little longer, then I hear Kat on the other side of the kitchen showing her dad how to use the camera. I wait some more.

Then Kat comes over and hands me a box. I try to rip it open and she giggles and stops me. She’s rather brilliant, and decided I should open the cake mix inside of our mixing bowl to avoid a mess. It worked.

Next she hands me a mixing cup. Then she cranks my wrist about 45 degrees in a clockwise direction. Then she does it again.

I learned this month that being able to see is a key factor in one’s ability to pour something. I spilled eggs and oil, but by the time we got to putting batter into the pans, Kat and I had a handle on things.

By Mike Gervais

And again. By the third time it’s clear that her challenge is going to be her patience. We’re on step two and she has to use one of her three directional sentences to explain that I have to hold the measuring cup upright if I want it to accurately measure anything. Next she guides me to the sink with a loud clunk. My knee found the cabinet before my hand found the sink.

So, we fill a measuring cup, stumble back to the counter and pour two cups of water in the mixing bowl. “Oh no!”

“What?”

Kat, my eyes, the experienced baker who could “bake this cake blindfolded,” doubled down on the amount of water the recipe called for. I hear more laughter and we ladle the excess water out of the mixing bowl and Kat assures me mom’s cake isn’t ruined.

I assure Kat she has a new nickname.

We get the mixture fixed and I find myself once again standing in silence, alone in the kitchen. I grope around looking for my eyes, but she’s nowhere to be found. Then I hear a cabinet door close and a new bowl thrust into my hands. “Two Cups,” as I’ve come to call my fiancée, has the bright idea that we will be measuring the oil over a clean bowl to make sure I don’t over-pour and make a mess. It’s a Our final product turned out really well. Does a little extra water mean an extra moist cake? I’m not sure, but Kat was a great guide and a perfect set of eyes for this fun and challenging date night.

good idea. Without her foresight, we would have ended up with an extra cup of oil in the cake mix or on the counter.

Next is the eggs. I can feel Kat cringe as I crack one egg after another. I’m sure she fished some shell out of the bowl, but she’s kind and won’t admit it. Then the mixing. I’ve made a cake before. With a Kitchen Aid. One can’t appreciate how convenient a mixer is until they have to do it by hand, blindfolded. “Is it mixed?”

“Keep going?” “Is it mixed?”

“Keep going. Make sure you scrape the sides.” “My arm is getting tired.” “Keep going.” “I think we’ve used up all our sentences.”

“Keep going.” Finally it’s done, we have cake batter. Kat is careful and adept at guiding her blind and clumsy baker and we have two trays with equally distributed batter. She takes my hand and guides it to the oven door. Nope. I failed to hold up by end of the bargain. As soon as my hand touches the warm door, I jump back and off comes the blindfold. I am not sticking my hand in the hot oven.

More laughter from her parents. All in all, the cake turned out great and my mom couldn’t believe I baked it blindfolded. Kat’s parents had a good laugh as we worked together, Kat got a new nickname and I know she doesn’t have to say anything and I don’t have to be able to see to know when she’s frustrated with me.

I also know that a measuring cup must be upright and level for it to work and I know when Kat “Two Cups” says she can do something blindfolded, it’s probably hyperbole. n

Independence Independence

Day Day with Kids with Kids

Cade Courtney, age 13: “It was the day the Declaration was signed and the war began. What I like are fireworks and sometimes the mishaps that come with them.”

It was July 4, 1777, when the first Independence Day was celebrated in Philadelphia. There were parades, concerts, and the firing of cannons and muskets. This was also when the first fireworks celebration took place, a tradition which has carried on for more than two centuries.

Although Independence Day wouldn’t become a federal holiday until 1870, it was still celebrated annually across our country. Many of the traditions of parades and fireworks have continued as this holiday has also become important to families with gatherings and barbecues.

These events provide memories for children to last a lifetime. Local children share their thoughts on Independence Day, their memories and why they think 4th of July is an important holiday.

Angelique Alejo, age 7 “I like to go to the park to watch fireworks.”

Nicolet Strain, age 8 “I don’t really know. It’s just fun.” Maia Owens, age 7 “It’s about celebrating my brother’s birthday.”

Thierry Thigpen, age 8 “Freedom and Fireworks.” Eli Swope, age 8 “Fourth of July is because people fought for what they thought was right.”

Eva Mudge, age 9 “It was our freedom from England. I like the fireworks.”

Rafe Owens, age 9 “To me it means how close it is to my birthday.”

Alexx Alejo, age 9 “I have fun with my family.”

Allison Goodson, age 13 “It recognizes our country and how it started and that’s cool. My dad usually bar-b-ques a lot and has friends over.”

From the corn fields to the bright lights

Albert E. Brumley, Jr., continues to uphold his father’s legacy

Albert E. Brumley, Jr., age 87, was born the second of six children to Albert and Goldie Edith Schell Brumley and raised in Powell, which sits near the juncture of Big Sugar Creek and Mikes Creek.

The sleepy little town once held several general stores, a blacksmith, a gas station, several churches and a watermill.

It was also home to one of the music industry’s most prolific gospel and popular songwiters, his father, Albert E. Brumley, Sr.

“Growing up, we made a lot of songbooks,” Brumley, Jr., said. “My brother, Robert, owned that business until his death last year.”

The family printed and published over 40 million songbooks, including books for organizations such as The Grand Ole’ Opry, Renfro Valley, Ozark Jubilee, and more.

“Mexican stations were very popular until television came along,” he said. “We’d take the sheet music to the binding shop in our home and Tom and Bob would put the sections in, and I would staple them. Bill did all the trimming. We advertised on a Mexican radio station, and we’d ship out 10,000 to 20,000 books a month—Gospel songs.”

That wasn’t their only experience with the music industry. They started locally, and eventually Albert Jr. moved on up the ladder.

“I remember growing up my brothers, Bill, Tom, Bob, and I would perform anywhere they asked us to,” he said. “Fox hunts, pie suppers, churches, and everywhere. It was a lot of fun doing that as a family.

“When I started in the music business I worked at KRMO right here in Monett in the mid-1950s. In 1955, I went to KOAM in Pittsburg, Kan., and was paid $25 a week.”

He was drafted into the Navy and ended up in Fresno, Calif., and in 1961, started performing with the likes of Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, Gene Autry, Bob Wills, Johnny Cash, Tex Ritter, Tennessee Ernie Ford, Merle Travis, and Lefty Frizzell, among other country greats on the The Cousin Herb Henson Trading Post TV Show.

“I stayed in California for 15 years,” Brumley said. “I moved to Nashville, Tenn., then Branson, where we hosted The Brumley Music Show, a variety and music show, six days a week.”

In the late 1990s, a gospel firm contacted Brumley wanting to know if he would be interested in doing a tribute album to his father.

“We recorded in a studio in Branson,” he said. “A lot of people were featured on that album. Merle Haggard, Roy Clark, Tommy Overstreet, Larry Gatlin, Crystal Gayle, Chet Atkins, Mel Tillis, Glenn Campbell, Johnny Russell and Lee Greenwood. I might not be remembering everyone.”

In addition, Brumley has performed at a variety of venues, which range

From left: Merle Haggard and Al Brumley, Jr., appeared at a photo shoot for a compilation album in tribute to his father, Al Brumley, Sr.

from the locally popular Kings Prairie concerts, to the 1995 gala honoring President George and Barbara Bush on their 50th wedding anniversary.

“That’s the one I am most proud of,” he said. “I was in attendance along with other celebrities including The Oak Ridge Boys, Vince Gill, Delta Burke, Gerald McRaney, Amy Grant, Phyllis Diller, Tommy Lasorda, Michael Smith, Chuck Norris, Lee Greenwood, Loretta Lynne, Roger Whittaker, Yakov Smirnoff, Lorrie Morgan and Sen. Fred Thompson.

“It was great to be able to do that with all of them. All of them liked George Bush as a person. I admired Barbara Bush’s bluntness.”

In addition, Brumley performed at area venues such as Precious Moments.

“We used to get 20 or 30 busses a day,” he said. “After Sam Bucher left, the attraction has started to decline.”

Brumley has also traveled extensively, performing his father’s songs at churches and other venues across the southland.

“We’ve been to Texas, Louisiana, Georgia and Florida,” he said. “In 1989, I took a bunch of people with me to Hawaii to visit a church and sing his songs. People from all over the world still download his songs from the internet. If you walk down the street in Germany, I’ll bet anyone you ask knows “I’ll Fly Away.” It is one of the most popular songs of all time.

“When I was a kid, we were at home and my Uncle Carol came running in and said, “Al, turn your radio on! They’re playin’ one of your songs!”

“Well, he didn’t turn the radio on. Instead he went back to his desk, and sat down and wrote “Turn Your Radio On” right then and there. He was always writing music. If he got an idea at 2 a.m., he would get up and write it down. I’ve written a few songs, but nothing like my dad or Merle did. Merle wrote night and day.”

Brumley spoke fondly of his family.

“[My father] didn’t seek publicity,” he said. “People knew his songs, but not who he was. He was a great man—quiet, reserved. My brother, Tom, played studio sessions for almost anyone you have ever heard of. He was one of the greatest guitar players of all time. He died 11 years ago, but he is legendary in the music industry for his steel guitar solo on “Together Again.”

Although he is retired now, he still has one more project up his sleeve.

“I’m wanting to do a pop album,” he said. “I’ve chosen several of my favorites, including “Only You,” “Sweet Dreams,” I Left My Heart in San Francisco,” “It’s Impossible,” and “Love is a Many Splendored Thing.” I’m still working on the list.”

For now, Brumley is content to spend time with his bride of 36 years, Robanell (Robin), on their 10-acre farm on Kings Prairie.

“Of all the places I’ve lived, I would pick the Ozarks every time,” he said. “I was raised here. It’s the way I was raised. I like the old timers telling their stories about growing up and things like that. It’s not like it used to be, but it’s still home. It always will be.” n

“Of all the places I’ve lived, I would pick the Ozarks every time.”

(top) Albert E. Brumley, Jr., is pictured with country artist Glenn Campbell. (above) Al Brumley, Jr., left, and Porter Waggoner are pictured singing an Al Brumley, Sr. song in a studio session to record “36 Greatest Gospel Memories: A Loving Tribute to Albert E. Brumley.”

Far From Home

Lieutenant Colonel John Blackburn, who managed Fort Sill’s Reynolds Army Health Clinic Emergency Operation Center from October 2020 through Feb. 1, 2021, discusses the operation center’s activities with a superior officer.

Lieutenant Colonel John Blackburn answers the call to protect others

People across the globe were impacted by COVID-19 (coronavirus) in some form or another, but for one area resident, the virus was a call to action that led him away from his family for months.

Local physical therapist and Lieutenant Colonel in the U.S. Army Reserves John Blackburn was called up in response to the pandemic and spent Oct. 1 2020, through Feb. 1, 2021, at Fort Sill, Okla., his duty station.

During his time serving the country, Blackburn missed his family and worked on the front line tracking cases of the virus through one of the busiest military bases in the country.

“I was there for four months during the surge,” John said. “Mainly, what they wanted me to manage was contact tracing and quarantine efforts.”

When the pandemic began, Fort Sill had compiled a team of healthcare professionals to handle those tracing and quarantine duties.

“Like your healthcare departments here, they all have other things to do that keep them 100 percent busy, and then we put the pandemic on them,” Blackburn said.

By October, the base knew it needed a dedicated team to manage that aspect of the pandemic response, and John was a likely candidate. Blackburn has been working in the healthcare industry since 1988 and attends two weeks of Reserve training at Fort Sill every year.

By the time he arrived at Fort Sill for his deployment, the military had established a 30-person Emergency Operation Center staffed by Army public health nurses and regular nurses from area clinics.

Blackburn’s job was to manage that new team and, together, develop a plan and procedure for tracking not only COVID cases among the base’s 53,000 permanent residents, but also recruits and trainees who frequent the base for classes and training courses.

“They deployed me specifically to manage that,” he said. “We were the ones to let those people know if they tested positive and tell them they had to quarantine. We had to go back 10 days prior to the onset of symptoms and figure out their timeline and they would have to gather information about what they did, where they were and who they were with. Our job was also to contact their contacts.”

Due to HIPPA regulations, the emergency management team could not tell people who it was they had contact with that had exposed them to the virus, which didn’t always go over well at a time when COVID fears were at a fever pitch and vaccinations against the virus seemed more like a distant dream than a reality.

“It was difficult,” John reflected. “I’ve had people cry. Fort Sill is also home to a lot of military schools and people would come from all over then find out they had to quarantine. And that was before we had procedures for online courses. We were dealing with something difficult like that every day.”

But breaking potentially frightening news to base residents and visitors wasn’t the only difficult part of the job. John’s deployment meant four months away from his family – his wife, Shanda; daughter, Lauren, 15; and son, Regan, 13.

“There were a lot of long days and lost weekends,” he said. “It was hard. But phone calls and Facetime helped a lot. My family took my deployment really well. I wasn’t gone for a full year which was a blessing.”

Blackburn was also fortunate to be deployed to a duty station relatively close to home.

At five hours away, working at Fort Sill allowed him monthly weekend passes to return home and visit family. He said he was fortunate to be able to spend Thanksgiving and Christmas with his wife and kids and attend his son’s Confirmation.

Blackburn said he was extremely cautious during his monthly visits home, paying for fuel at the pump and avoiding contact with the public whenever possible.

He also said he was cautious while he was home.

“I didn’t even see my parents at

Christmas,” he said. “That was before they had the shot.” While there were trying moments during his deployment, Blackburn said he has come away from the experience with a sense of pride and accomplishment. “It was eye-opening to see how one contact became exponential and how many people it could affect,” Blackburn said. “But I’m pretty confident that we have a system in place that will make the next time easier. I’m proud of the work I did and the process and procedures we developed. John Blackburn says goodbye to his kids: daughter, He also said he was fortuLauren, 15; and son, Regan, 13; before answering nate to work with a dedicated the call of duty and deploying to Fort Sill, Okla., in and talented staff that made October 2020. the work at Fort Sill possible. “I got to work with some very talented people and I had a really good support team back home. Cox Monett supported me and some of the employees there would send me care packages.” For his time at Fort Sill, Blackburn received an Army Commendation Award, and a set of challenge coins from high-ranking Fort Sill officers. In the recommendation for his commendation, Blackburn’s superiors said he “brilliantly managed the Reynolds Army Healthcare Clinic COVID Emergency Operation Center as the OIC and liaison to the Fort Sill EOC and supporting units. He revised and maintained the RAHC COVID-19 patient tracker, which facilitated the tracking and monitoring of over 9,000 COVID contacts within the Fort Sill community. His leadership and personal management skills of over 30 soldiers and civilians directly impacted the EOC’s successful tracking, briefing and mitigation of COVID-19.” n