Month: July 2016

FAITH IS A GIFT

By Lisa Huddleston

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I can’t really publish this as I would like to, because it’s meant to be a song, and I have rarely ever written a tune (ONCE). Therefore, I’m just going to throw these words out and see what happens.

As many of you know, I often battle against despair–I doubt God, I doubt salvation, I even doubt doubt. But, many of you also know that God never lets go of me! I attribute much of His tenacious faith to the beautiful place I live and commonly refer to as “Hudfarm.” This land has been in my husband’s family for five generations, and it is still a nourishing place in which to raise a soul. What a gift!

So … my kids all write music. Maybe one of them will feel moved. And many of my friends are also talented musicians who just may see through the simplistic words and hear the melody of my heart–I imagine it to be acoustic with a slightly, minor key. But who knows? Maybe it’s a rap or a polka or something? Okay, then. Here goes nothin:

“Faith is a Gift”

Faith is a gift, Believing is a gift   (repeat kind of chant-like)

Verse 1

When I feel the sunrise lifting

When I watch it as it sets

Then I know you’re near me

Then your gift I get

Verse 2

When the blossoms flower

And even when they dry

Your colors quench my thirsting

Your love’s the reason why that–

Bridge

Faith is a gift

Believing is a gift

Only to be given

Nothing I can buy

Faith is a gift

Believing is a gift

As needed as the raindrops

Falling from the sky

Verse 3

When wind chimes ring so softly

When thunder roars then dies

When lightning bugs just flicker

My soul lifts up a sigh

Verse 4

From springtime unto summer

In both wintertime and fall

I feel your Spirit warm me

My heart can’t help but call that–

Bridge

Faith is a gift

Believing is a gift

Only from the Spirit

Dripping from His lips

Faith is a gift

 Believing is a gift

Drowning out the hatred

With just a single sip

Faith is a gift, Believing is a gift (repeat to end)

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DIRTY ANKLES AND STREET LIGHTS

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By Lisa Huddleston

When the street lights came on, we were supposed to head home.

And our baths were drawn. And Mr. Bubbles and Mommy were waiting. And our Daddy was shrilly whistling out the front door meaning, “Come home, little girl. It’s time to scrub off the dirt ring that’s gathered around your Keds and thank God for another good day.”

And now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake–I hope Mr. Bubbles is waiting and the scum still soaks off with ease and just a little extra rubbing around the ankles. And I’d love to put on clean seer-sucker baby doll pjs to wear to bed.

Amen.

ARE YOUR EYES OPEN?

By Lisa Huddleston

I listened on the radio (NPR, of course), and I watched off and on on television (C-Span, NPT, and the networks), and I can’t stand seeing what’s going on in America. Yes, I used to cheer the snide comments, the digs that hit right where I wanted them to. But now–I hate it all. Politics seems so stupid. Like–where did logic go? Did it die somewhere along the way? Is it suddenly okay to plagiarize? To shout slogans with no meaning behind them? To wildly applaud when nothing true has been said? Ugh.

I don’t know where I belong. Definitely not with the “gun-toting Republicans” and not with the “baby-killing Democrats.” Where is my place in this world?

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And I suppose that is the point. I have no place in this world.

I pray that you will have a beautiful day. That your eyes will be open to the lovely, natural vignettes of beauty that lie before you. Look. See. Rejoice.

Amen.

SPINNING THROUGH THE THICK AND THE THIN

By Lisa Huddleston

This is not a creative or artistic or poetic attempt. What this post is is simply an informative and hopefully encouraging word for any of my readers who understand what it means to have chronic depression–or maybe any chronic illness.

For the fifth time, I am going through an adjustment period with yet another antidepressant. As the fourth one leaves my system, the fifth is building, and I am experiencing the not-so-lovely effects of nausea, irritability, anxiety, weepiness, self-hatred, and so on. Is it due to losing the previous med or introducing the latest? Who knows? And really who ever knows why exactly they are feeling as they are?

One dear friend calls me a warrior and refers to my experience as a battle. I guess she is right in some ways, but I really just feel more like a crappy scrap of paper being blown whichever way the wind goes.

If this new drug (to me) works–Yay! Maybe I will finally settle down and rest in some semblance of peace.

If it does not–and odds are that it will work some but not without the sad side effects of numbing my brain–I am considering an entirely new approach. Maybe I’ll write about it some time. Time will tell.

13522861_10209613899211009_3249131363915354502_oBut as I wait and see, I am learning to spin yarn from raw wool. (Just go with me here. No segue–I know.) Naturally I see the similarities between this attempt and the other. I see connections between everything!

My first yarn barely resembled yarn at all. It was wooly fat blobs, thin stringy spirals, and spots that wouldn’t hold together when given even a slight tug. Fat, strung-out, and falling apart. (Mm hm.)13584697_10209749803768538_3702832674588222962_o

Now I am actually spinning real yarn. Not perfectly but better nearly every time I sit down at the wheel. Am I a yarn warrior yet? Perhaps not, but I have sweat and cursed enough to feel battle worn and torn by the learning process.  And victory is in sight.

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A long obedience in the same direction is the only possibility for victory. Keep spinning, my fellow warriors. So will I.