Back from Oklahoma

We got back from Oklahoma today from shooting in Tulsa and Muskogee.

We got back from Oklahoma today from shooting in Tulsa and Muskogee, thanks to some last-minute funding from exec producer Kristian Morton. Production assistant and cameraman Eric Diener, Pamela Haymond, and I drove 28 straight hours in five shifts across the deserts and plains to Tulsa in the wee small hours Thursday the 15th, arriving in Oklahoma on Friday morning. The reason for the sudden trip was that Patty’s daughter Dee Ann, whom she hadn’t seen in 24 years, decided to contact her. In the next four days, we saw Patty—now in her own subsidized apartment after four months in a homeless shelter—surrounded by her son Darrell, Dee Ann, and Dee Ann’s finance Joey. A lot happened in those four days, much of it harrowing and difficult to watch as it unfolded. The one person who still hasn’t been contacted is the criminal at the heart of Patty’s past, a man named Frank, whose story is written in court papers.

Things heard, not always seen Patty still isn’t sober, and in follwing her story for nearly two years now, I still haven’t seen any sign that Patty will recover; her past is too painful to confront. Sometimes the choices we refuse to make become the choices we’ve made. You can get a glimpse of some of the shoot here:

Dee Ann

“As Lord is my God, the Holy Witness, I never abused you or Darrell. In the name of Jesus Christ, strike me down dead if I abused you or Darrell in any way. It was your father.”

For me, I have to forgive to set my soul free.