Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Where I'm From

I am from an Appalachian mountain hollow, from Duz detergent with free glasses, and from dirt roads.

I am from a 1900 clapboard farmhouse, a Warm Morning stove for winter heat and open windows in the summer where I fell asleep listening to the sound of whippoorwills and an occasional barking dog.

I am from day lilies (we called them flags), rose of sharon, butterfly bushes and mountain laurel.

I am from a Viars breakfast, from a place where it was unheard of not to have potatoes at nearly every meal.

I am from the Viars and the Evans – frugal and hardworking folks, where love was found both in hugs and their provision.

I am from sitting up late listening to the grownups talk about their childhood days, where I learned more about my heritage from those conversations than I would have from a thousand questions I may have asked.

I am from ‘salt will dry your blood’ and ‘if you look at that centipede all your teeth will fall out’. From ‘come on over and sit a spell’. From a neighbor who would chop down a hundred year old tree with nothing but an ax because he thought it was preventing your mobile home from getting to your land.

I am from a country church where the Holy Ghost was as welcome as the preacher, from the community/family cemetery where Decoration Day was the annual family reunion.

From a one room school, a hand pump where we drew our drinking water, from making cups from a sheet of notebook paper.

I am from born at home in a three room house, catching crawdads in the creek, and fishing with a stick pole, string and a bent safety pin.

From a place where mountain people stuck together just because that’s the way we were. Where ‘outsiders’ were not easily accepted but had to earn our trust, just because that’s the way we were.

Where I’m from is a place where I will probably never go back to live but will live forever in my heart. For it is the place that helped to form me into the person I am today.


Where are you from?



Hugs,
Molly

Friday, July 22, 2011

Share or Hoard?

O.K., so it has been a long time since my last post. Over two months! Did I simply vanish like Howard Hughes? Or find myself stranded in a remote location without access to computers and internet?

No glamorous or mysterious circumstances pulled me away. No excuse other than I simply found other things to occupy my time.

Granted, some of those things were happy occasions, celebrating achievement and milestones with my family. Others were simply thieves of time.

I’ve had plenty of nudges during my time away from the blogging world. Things I felt that needed to be shared, that I wanted to share. But I did not respond to those nudges. Instead, as time went on I found it easier to ignore them.


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Today, I am choosing to return to my world of blogging, trusting God to help me be faithful in sharing what He is doing in my life. For life is meant to be shared, not hoarded.

Uncommon – Webster’s Dictionary defines it as ‘Not common; unusual. Far beyond the usual, normal, or customary. Remarkable.’

If I want to write about my unCommon life, I must first live it. An unCommon life is not one of ease, nor is it a bed of roses. Trials and thorns, delays and disease, sacrifice and servant hood are all required, all part of this world.

You may be thinking, ‘so, what’s so uncommon about that? Everyone faces those issues!’

This is true. But when I respond to the hard, the ugly, and the painful circumstances by leaning into God - trusting Him, obeying Him, and seeking Him - I find answers.

Sharing my journey can be another way of becoming unCommon. Perhaps sharing my faith walk will encourage another woman to persevere in hers as well.

And so, dear friends (I do consider each one of you reading this as a dear friend, though we may never meet face to face), I am back. I commit to sharing with you through this medium until God chooses to direct me elsewhere. I will be working on several posts over the next few weeks describing a recent valley of life, prayerfully considering how to share a message of hope while protecting those who have been traveling through the valley with me. Please pray with me that He will use my life to bring hope and encouragement to others.


Love and Hugs,
Molly
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