Linda Dellinger, Interview

The Muscogee (Creek) Nation
Historic and Cultural Preservation Department
Oral History Program

“A Twenty-First Century Pandemic in Indian Country:
The Resilience of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation Against Covid-19”

As Remembered by: Mrs. Linda Dellinger
Interview by: Ms. Midge Dellinger
Date: January 27, 2021

Transcription: The Audio Transcription Center
Edited by: Ms. Midge Dellinger

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:00:03] Okay Mrs. Dellinger, we are recording. This is Midge Dellinger, oral historian for the Muscogee (Creek) Nation. Today is January 27, 2021. I am at my home at Tulsa, Oklahoma interviewing Muscogee citizen Mrs. Linda Dellinger who is at her home. We are performing our interview this way to remain safe from the COVID-19 pandemic. I am performing this interview on behalf of the Muscogee Creek Nation Historic and Cultural Preservation Department for the oral history project titled “A Twenty-First Century Pandemic in Indian Country: The Resilience of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation Against COVID-19.”
Mrs. Dellinger, thank you for being here with me today and [00:01:00] being willing to participate in this project. I’d like to start out by giving you a few minutes to share just a little bit with us about yourself.

LINDA DELLINGER: I am Linda Mendoza Dellinger. I live in Tulsa. Like Midge said, I’m a Muscogee citizen. My husband and I have four children, I have two step children and we had two children. There’s two boys and two girls. There are twelve grandchildren and the twenty-third great grandchild is on the way, so we have a nice big loving family.
I’m excited about doing this interview today. I hope what I have to say will [00:02:00] help people, maybe encourage people now and in the future.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:02:15] Mrs. Dellinger, can you tell me your clan and your tribal town?

LINDA DELLINGER: I am of the Raccoon Clan and the tribal town is New Tulsa.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:02:30] And where did you grow up?

LINDA DELLINGER: I grew up in Tulsa. My grandparents from the time I can remember lived in Okmulgee. Their original home was Hitchita. I think maybe I traveled there as a three-year-old I know for sure because I have a story about that. But my grandparents lived in Okmulgee at the Okmulgee Indian Baptist Church [00:03:00] on the church grounds. My grandpa was the pastor there until he passed away. He was there probably twenty years; she was there thirty years. So I have a good connection to the Okmulgee Indian Baptist Church.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:03:27] And growing up in Tulsa, where did you attend school?

LINDA DELLINGER: I graduated from Tulsa Central. My husband always says, “When it was downtown,” so graduated before they built the new Tulsa Central High School.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:03:46] Then what did you do after you graduated from high school?

LINDA DELLINGER: Following my graduation in May, I went to work at Meadow Gold Dairy up on North Denver as the [00:04:00] office manager’s secretary’s assistant. That’s where I worked, that’s where I met my husband. We were married maybe a year and a half after I went to work there. I worked off and on after the birth of our daughter. Then again after the birth of our son I worked peoples’ vacations. Worked until we moved to the Chicago area because of my husband’s job transfer.
Then we traveled around the country, lived in the Chicago area, Deland, Florida, Roanoke, Virginia, back to Tulsa, [00:05:00] off to Houston, Texas, Columbus, Ohio, and finally back to Tulsa in 1990, and we have been here since then.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:05:21] Are you involved in any organizations or communities?

LINDA DELLINGER: I attend the Tulsa Creek Indian Community Center. I think maybe I’ve been going there maybe about fourteen years. Worked there, helped cook lots of meals there, lots of potluck dinners there, helped plan get togethers for the community, did some emceeing for the [00:06:00] senior citizen groups when they met for their monthly brunch and their monthly lunch. That was always a fun time when we got together with the seniors.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:06:19] Is there anything else that you would like to share with us about your life?

LINDA DELLINGER: I’ve lived in several cultures. The white culture, the Indian culture, the Mexican culture. My mom and dad, after they were first married, lived with my Mexican grandmother. My mom learned to cook a lot of Mexican food so I have learned to cook a lot of Mexican food. Of course my mom grew up cooking. They lived out in the country and raised a lot of their own food, lots of [00:07:00] vegetables. So I did learn to cook a lot of different foods from my mom.
Looking back, I think it was a good growing up time, not thinking how we were being exposed to the Indian culture and the Mexican culture, but I enjoy both of those cultures. The friendships, the families, the get togethers, the holidays, the different holidays that both cultures had. So looking back, it’s been a good life.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:07:50] Good, that sounds great. Thank you for sharing with us these things about yourself. Now what I’d like to do is transition into [00:08:00] some questions that I would like to ask you about your experience with the coronavirus also known as COVID-19. First question I would like to ask you, is do you remember when in 2020 you first heard about the coronavirus?

LINDA DELLINGER: I’m thinking it might have been on a news program in January or early February that year. Of course at that time it was something that was going on in China and I didn’t really pay too much attention to it because I thought, oh, that’s so far away, it would take a long time for it to be in the United States. I wasn’t [00:09:00] too concerned about it.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:09:05] Do you remember at what point after that during 2020 that your understanding and thoughts about the virus did become more concerned?

LINDA DELLINGER: I think when everything started shutting down, was it in the middle of March or the middle of February? Maybe like the third week in February when there was the case in Tulsa, the first case in Tulsa, and that man did pass away. Then that really brought it close to home. It wasn’t just in the United States; it was right here in Tulsa where I lived. [00:10:00] From then on, of course the first thing they were saying is it could be very fatal for the elders. I remember sitting here looking out my window one day, probably in March, thinking being an elder, okay, is this how I’m going to die, am I going to die from this virus. It was a very sobering thought and a very sobering afternoon. I thought no, that’s not going to be—I’m not going to let that happen, I’m going to do everything I can to keep myself safe, keep my [00:11:00] family safe, listen to what I’m being told to do to be safe, just take every precaution on my side that I could. And that if that happened I knew I would know I had done everything I could do to prevent something like that happening to me, to my family members. I just wanted us all to be safe.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:11:36] Mrs. Dellinger, can you share with me what is your knowledge about COVID-19, what do you know about COVID-19 and what it could do to you if you were to contract it?

LINDA DELLINGER: I know that it spreads very easily. It spreads [00:12:00] by our breath, our coughs, our sneezing, our talking, our singing, anything that projects our breath into somebody else’s airway. I always wear a mask when I go out. I wear gloves when I go out. I know that there are people who see that differently, but I can’t help that. I’m going to do what I feel I need to do and I will keep myself safe, and I’m hoping that I keep other people safe, because I know it’s something that a lot of people may be sick with the virus with no symptoms but they’re still able [00:13:00] to pass that on to someone else. So I’m very aware of where I am and who’s around me when I go out.
I know that your symptoms can be mild, they can be like the flu, they can be like a cold, but it can also affect your lungs and your breathing, your ability to breathe, your air sacs not expanding like they should to give you the oxygen that you need. That’s where a lot of especially elderly people get in trouble with their being able to breathe, being able to get their oxygen into their cells. When their body is overcome by the virus and its ability to fight it off, then the body, it sounds to me like your poor little body just gets worn out, and it just can’t go on any longer, and your heart just gives out from this big huge fight. That’s about what I know. I guess that’s about all I know.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:14:28] It sounds like you have a very thorough knowledge of the virus, so that’s good. When the virus first came into the country and as you say, into your own area here in Tulsa, can you recall any of the initial conversations that you had with your family and friends?

LINDA DELLINGER: I think we were all just [00:15:00] caught off guard by how quickly it was here and how that one man’s being a victim of it, people surrounded him, his church members, then they were next to get it, people who had been around him. I think just realizing how fast it can spread caught us all kind of off guard. But then it also made us very aware and everyone was taking all the safety precautions they could.
Staying away from my husband and I. When we were together everybody was wearing masks. [00:16:00] I think maybe the first time we were all together the windows and doors were all open to let in a lot of air, make sure air was passing through the house. We were very careful about as we were eating, taking precautions, not talking so much when we were eating, eating outside. I think maybe those were the first things we—we just ate outside. So the family was very aware and took precautions also.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:16:46] I was going to ask you how have you remained in contact with family and friends. It sounds like you and your family have remained in [00:17:00] contact with one another throughout the pandemic, but that you have been doing this following all the precautions and the safety measures that the CDC has provided. That’s good. I’m assuming that your family has continued to check on you and your husband and stay in contact with you as well.

LINDA DELLINGER: Yes, we stay in contact. Either on the phone, texting, Facebook, emails, just anything we can think of to kind of keep in touch and know what each family is going through because we still have school age children in our families, [00:18:00] and so that’s a concern too, how they are able to do their schooling and still be safe.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:18:13] And it sounds like for the most part you have continued and been able to take care of yourself and your husband. You’ve continued to go out on your errands when you have needed to. Is this true?

LINDA DELLINGER: Yes. Like I said before, put my mask on, I wear gloves, change gloves each time I go into a different store. I am now picking up my groceries curbside. I go to a bread store, I go to a meat market, and I got to Ace Hardware. Those are my go to stores right now. Everything else [00:19:00] that I might need, I can order it online, and it’s mailed to the house. So there’s really no going out shopping, window shopping, anything like that. It’s just home, in the car, pick up items, and back home.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:19:35] Mrs. Dellinger, I’m going to ask you a question now that may or may not be difficult to answer. If you feel like potentially you would rather not answer this question, that’s absolutely fine. But I would like to ask you if you, or anyone in the family, or any of your friends have contracted the [00:20:00] virus and if so, what was that experience like for that individual and for you too?

LINDA DELLINGER: Yes, we have had episodes in our family. The oldest granddaughter, her husband, both, they had it at the same time. They have high school age sons; they did not contract it. They kept them separate in the house or they stayed separate in the house. The oldest daughter, she contracted it from her church family. She had more like flu symptoms, not so much the breathing issues. Her son, [00:21:01] he is a pastor, he had the breathing issues, and he did have a tough fight on his hands. He wasn’t hospitalized, but just being at home, and having difficulty breathing. Just not being able to take deep breaths.
I was trying to think. I think those were the only four that have had it. They were sick, yes, but they were able to overcome it and get through all the difficult, the painful feverish times.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:21:55] I want to shift gears a little bit here and I want to ask you a question [00:22:00] about the Muscogee (Creek) Nation administration. How do you think the Muscogee (Creek) Nation administration, so we’re talking about the leadership of the Nation, how do you think that they have been performing throughout the pandemic? And have they helped you specifically with any need that you have had throughout this pandemic?

LINDA DELLINGER: Well, I know at the very beginning my husband and I were going to the Sapulpa Community and having senior lunches. We would go there maybe three, four times a week. Of course we would meet friends there from the Tulsa Creek Indian Community and it was just a lunchtime [00:23:00] social time. When everything started being locked down, they still provided lunches for us. We drove by and they gave us frozen lunches a whole week at one time in a box. We’d come home, put it in the freezer, and we would have lunch every day that week.
Later they had an issue and stopped serving for a while. When everything was cleared and it was safe to do so again, they were back to providing a daily meal that you drove by and picked up. I thought at the time that was such a good thing for the seniors [00:24:00] who were there. There were couples, senior couples, but then there were also a lot of single elders who were there that to me I felt like sometimes maybe that was the only hot meal that they might of had that day. So it was something that they enjoyed and looked forward to. I thought that was really good that they were able to keep that going even if it was just driving by and they were putting it in the car for you.
There have also been food giveaways in October, in November, in December, that I’m sure helped so many families. Not just the elderly families, but all the families of the Nation that [00:25:00] had families to feed. I don’t know if a lot of people had lost their jobs or what, but I know for us it was a big help grocery-wise to have that food. I think maybe I was a little surprised that it was such good quality food, and canned goods, and produce, bakery items. So that has been a good help in families at this time.
The next issue is when the vaccine was made available. I saw on the Muscogee Facebook page that you could call in and get your name on a list to receive a shot. [00:26:00] That the elders could do that. The day before New Year’s Eve I called in. I didn’t have a number, I just started calling, I think I called Koweta Clinic and got several numbers to try. I finally spoke to a real person and I got my name on the list. She said that they would call me to make an appointment. My thought was oh my goodness, who knows when they might get around to calling me.
I got a call on the fourth or fifth of January, yeah, the fifth of January, [00:27:00] the next Tuesday, and got an appointment for the next day. Which I was just so surprised that everything was working so well. Then later I had been trying to get my husband’s name on a list to get a shot. A friend of a friend called me and said they were giving shots at the River Spirit Casino parking lot. I didn’t know if my husband would be able to get a shot or not.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:27:49] And why is that?

LINDA DELLINGER: At Koweta they had told me they weren’t doing that for spouses at that time but to keep calling because [00:28:00] in the future they might be doing that, even though he was not a tribal member of any Muscogee or any other tribe. But I went to River Spirit, they asked me if I had an appointment, I said no, but I was Muscogee, my husband was not a tribal member anywhere, but he was eighty-six years old. They passed me onto someone else, then they passed me onto another lady, and she approved his getting a shot because of his age. I was just so thankful. (crying) It makes me want to cry now. It took such a stress off.
Now I realize he was not the only [00:29:00] one that got a shot that day that was not Muscogee, was not a tribal citizen anywhere, but he was an elder, and they took the time and gave us that shot that I’m so thankful for. So we will go back in February. I will go back to Koweta; he will go back to River Spirit to get our second shots. Just so thankful for the job, the good job, that they have been doing in getting the vaccine out to the people in need.
Of course I realize the healthcare workers, the elders, [00:30:00] teachers, all those people who are so susceptible and in places where they can be exposed. Of course the elders, just to protect them, because they are in that group that has more fatalities than some of the younger groups. I’m very thankful for the Muscogee Nation and all they have done to this point.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:30:39] Thank you for sharing those things with me. I want to go back to something that you said a little bit earlier. There’s a term that you used and I just wanted you to explain a little bit. You said when the Muscogee Nation went into lockdown, [00:31:00] so what exactly does lockdown mean?

LINDA DELLINGER: The communities and like the Sapulpa communities where they cooked and had everyone coming in every day for lunch and everything, I think the Chief on down sent a letter for everyone’s safety not to have meetings, or gatherings, or dinners at the community centers. That was what affected us because we went to a lot of meetings, we went to a lot of meals either at the Tulsa Community Center or like I said, daily over to the Sapulpa Community Center. So they were not able to have us in the building, [00:32:00] so many people in the building at a time like in the past.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:32:09] We are now over a year into the pandemic and the pandemic continues, how have you been able to continue staying in contact with your community friends and how has the community been able to continue doing their business, taking care of the things that they need to take care of for themselves?

LINDA DELLINGER: I know the community board still meets. They started having Zoom meetings. The community sends out a monthly newsletter. We still communicate by phone, [00:33:00] text messages. When something has happened, we have had some deaths in our community, and word really gets around quick when it’s necessary just by way of phone calls and texts. I know we have received cards, and the phone calls, and the texts for different things, birthdays. I know for a while different friends were getting together for birthdays and things.
I think my husband and I went once and then I wasn’t comfortable in the restaurant that we went to. They kept us apart from other people in the restaurant but then they seated us [00:34:00] all right next to each other and I wasn’t comfortable with that. So we never went to any of the other gatherings that friends made. Even funerals that had been in our community, my gut was telling me no, don’t go, don’t go. I would go before or after, days before, the day before, hours before funerals and things, but not when everyone was going to be there. I just did not feel it was a good thing to do for me. I’m a caregiver, I need to be able to take care of my husband. [00:35:00] I did make a lot of decisions because of that.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:35:14] I want to go back to the vaccine because you said that you have been vaccinated at this point and the vaccine right now is a shot with a booster shot. There’s been a lot reported in the news about the vaccine and continues to be reported in the news about the vaccine. I know there are a lot of folks in this country who are afraid to get the vaccine and are refusing to get the vaccine so there’s this big push now it seems in the media to encourage people to do that. [00:36:00] Did you have any side effects from the vaccine after your first shot?

LINDA DELLINGER: No, I didn’t. I am a two-time cancer survivor. I am not to have shots in my arms because of they removed a lot of lymph nodes. So I had to get the shot in my hip. I didn’t feel any soreness or anything like that. My husband got his shot in his arm. He commented the next morning that his arm was sore, [00:37:00] he didn’t know why, and so I told him you had a shot there, that’s why your arm is sore. But he never commented on it after that morning.
It wasn’t red. When we took his Band-Aid off there wasn’t any blood on it or anything. It was just as clean as when they put it on there. So no, we didn’t have any bad side effects.
We always get a flu shot and so that’s what I compared this to was this was another shot to help prevent us getting this virus, or if because of the new [00:38:00] strains that are out there, maybe would lessen the degree or the severity of how it would affect us if we got one of the variations. I saw it as a good thing, as a positive thing. That’s what I’m thinking.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:38:31] Okay, you just answered what was going to be my next question pertaining to your confidence in the vaccine. It sounds like you are confident in the vaccine. All right, so moving on here, I want to ask you, and again, this is a question that potentially if you don’t feel comfortable answering [00:39:00] you can just tell me so, but I want to see if you have any opinion or any thoughts about how the state of Oklahoma and the federal government have been handling the pandemic for over the last year now.

LINDA DELLINGER: I think things could have been done so much better. A state mandate on masks, even a government mandate on masks, people still could have had their say about how they felt about wearing a mask. They could have put it everywhere if they would have just done it. [00:40:00] I don’t think we would have been or have seen so many deaths if that one little thing could have been taken up and used by everyone instead of making so much of it that people have died. So many people have died because of it.
And just staying home and staying away from each other. I know that’s hard. We’ve experienced it, it is hard. You want to be with your family, with your loved ones, but being away, keeping your distance, of course washing your hands and all those kind of things, just if everybody [00:41:00] had done what would have been the best for all of us. But people have their own way of thinking, I guess. It could have been so much better, I think, if there hadn’t been this side and that side, just thinking about the common good for all of us.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:41:38] You think that the pandemic became too political. It became more of a political issue than a health issue.

LINDA DELLINGER: Yes.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:41:51] For future generations of Muscogee who may [00:42:00] find themselves trying to survive something like what we have been trying to survive for over the last year now with this pandemic, which of course has created a horrific health and economic crisis for everyone in the world, can you give me some final words of wisdom or guidance about how to live in a situation like this during a pandemic like what we’re all in and be able to survive such a catastrophic event?

LINDA DELLINGER: I am thinking that what we have done this last year [00:43:00] maybe keeping to ourselves, listening, and learning, taking in all that you see and you hear, and doing what each individual can do to keep themselves safe and their families safe, and to share that with their families and their loved ones. Like please do this, please wear your masks, don’t come to my house if you’ve been somewhere with a whole bunch of people. Just think things through. Wherever you’re going to be going, whatever you’re going to be doing, think about yourself, think about your family, [00:44:00] think about your neighbors.
We live in a neighborhood of elderly people and I’ve stayed away from them. We talk across the driveways, we have taken our lawn chairs and everybody sits in their driveway and talked across the street. Just to be aware of what you’re doing and how it could affect your family and actually everyone around you. I guess maybe to be aware. Listen to the news, listen to what’s being said, and take all the precautions that you possibly can to keep yourself and your family safe. [00:45:00]

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:45:01] That’s great advice. Thank you so much for that. In closing our interview, I just want to give you an opportunity if there’s anything else that you would like to share or say pertaining to the COVID-10 pandemic.

LINDA DELLINGER: I am looking forward to the end of this. I’m not thinking that it’s going to be any time real soon, maybe by next fall we can all get out and enjoy fall activities, and enjoy being together, but I think I am still going to be doing the mask and the gloves for a while to come. But that is something to look forward to. I think there will be [00:46:00] an end to it. I’m hoping that people have learned in this year all the things that they actually can do without and still enjoy the life and love with their families and all their loved ones around them.

MIDGE DELLINGER: [00:46:32] Thank you, Mrs. Dellinger. Those are wonderful words of hope as we continue to endure this pandemic. I just want to thank you for taking time out of your day, and spending with me, and participating in this project, and sharing your experiences, and your insights, and your thoughts about the COVID-19 pandemic. Thank you very much.

LINDA DELLINGER: You’re welcome.
END OF INTERVIEW
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