A Baking Powder Pause: An Appalachian Perspective on Stories of Hope: Choosing to Rise Above Hardship and Challenge

By W. Carol Johnson

This book contains twenty stories of hope from those (including the author) who have chosen to rise out of hardship and challenge into joy and service to others. The use of baking powder as a symbol for the action-agent or catalyst for the "rising" process originates from the author's great grandmother's incredible biscuits, all symbolic of a transformation made possible by that "magic ingredient" and the life-giving bread that resulted.These stories carry the unique Appalachian context of the author, which flavors her own experiences and her interpretations of the shared experiences of others.The author challenges you to pause to reflect on whatever name you give that special ingredient in your own life to rise into light and service.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Mar 16, 2021
• ISBN: 9781098058807

Book preview

cover.jpg

A Baking Powder Pause: An Appalachian Perspective on Stories of Hope

Choosing to Rise Above Hardship and Challenge

W. Carol Johnson

Copyright © 2020 by W. Carol Johnson

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without the prior written permission of the publisher. For permission requests, solicit the publisher via the address below.

Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.

832 Park Avenue

Meadville, PA 16335

www.christianfaithpublishing.com

The scriptures used are New International Version (NIV).

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Biscuits of Life

Water of Life

Looking for Comfort

The Walls That Divide Us

Hen and Chicks

Blue

Out of Alignment

The Feast of Love

Witness Story

The Kindness of Harold

The Power of the Unborn

The Pearl of Great Value

The Wren

Hollowed Out

Clinging Vines

Sara and the Promise

Toby

The Jailer’s Wife

Angels on the Lake

Green Pepper Jelly and Banjo Pickin’ Food

To my dear little sister, Therese Richerson, for her loving support in this process of life and writing! You are such a precious gift to all of us!

To my friend Sue Dobbs, the first to read the original material, freely giving her prayerful support and encouragement. You, too, are precious to me!

Acknowledgment

I want to thank my son, Jeff Kurtz, for his support and assistance in initiating the publishing process and to CFP for assistance.

Thank you to Rev. Preston and Leesa Foster for the careful review and encouragement.

Thank you to my daughters, siblings, and friends for the support and encouragement in this project. You are all deeply loved!

I especially thank the incredible people who courageously shared their stories, blessing us all with the lessons learned.

May our faithful and loving God bless and provide many biscuits to each reader and many opportunities to pass them on!

Introduction

It may seem strange to refer to baking powder when looking at life’s struggles. But for me, growing up in the hills of Kentucky years ago, baking powder became symbolic of what is needed to make a rising up occur when I would find myself stagnant or stuck. As a catalyst, an action-agent, baking powder becomes the Spirit that moves otherwise dormant ingredients into a new shaping, a conforming…a transformation process…with delightful results!

As a proud product of the mountain culture of Kentucky, I treasure the years of exposure to that time and place. The lengthy visits with my great-grandparents (Mama and Papa) in Wesley Holler were filled with biscuits (and watching that transformation process), garden work, playing with cutouts from an old Sears catalog, kerosene lanterns and fireplace gatherings at night, homemade apple butter, and butter from the churn. I remember gathering eggs, gathering in kindling for the wood box behind the kitchen stove, and using the wash stand where cleaning up took place. I remember the smell of rose talcum powder when Mama would be going to town, walking the two miles out of the hollow, and another mile or more to the community store called Botner’s in the center of Traveler’s Rest. I learned to appreciate country/Bluegrass, gospel music, and Billy Graham roaring from the battery-operated radio Papa would often take to the yard and lawn chairs there, as the sounds of owls, whip-poor-wills, frogs, and insects chimed in, and we would silently tap the earth at our feet.

Mourning doves, an occasional coyote, frogs along the nearby steam, and whistling wind in the trees added to the chorus that prompted me to rise up early from the warm bedding Mama had lovingly made for her family. The smell of fresh biscuits from the wood-fired kitchen stove (no electricity was ever allowed in that house) and the smell of wood burning and small bits of coal in the fireplace at the foot of our beds were an added sensual experience, as was the ticking of the mantel clock. Even in summer, there was a mist and chill in the air. The morning greetings from the awakening, rejoicing birds near the open window by the bed urged my eyes to further open and my small body to move. All of this was being imprinted in my young impressionable mind, providing a place of solace and harmony, when in yet-to-come years I would need to rise out of the darkness threatening to consume me or the people I loved.

Memories of less than pleasant childhood experiences include the house fire that took our home when I was eight years old…the ever-etched image of fire catching and consuming the curtains in our home’s windows, as we watched from the neighbor’s home across the road, an all-encompassing blaze, consuming everything in its wake in a short time. My mother was never the same, and life was never the same, following that event. We three children wandered in a daze for a long time, with parents who became even more distant from one another and us. I would often travel in my mind to the peaceful mornings in Wesley Hollow, finding a peaceful, spiritual calm settle over me. Generosity in the community arose like a pleasant aroma, and we slowly began to rise out of those ashes, embraced by a love that was visible, tangible.

The Church became a catalyst for our rising out of despair (no insurance, no social services, no food stamps, etc.), and I would later in life choose to serve those who struggle, perhaps in an attempt to do for others what had proven so life-altering for me and my family. Like the baking powder in biscuits, like hope…the Presence that helped us rise out of dormancy, out of despair, changed the ingredients of our lives. Each of us lost much, each of us learned much, each in our family would remember in our own way, and each of us would rise above, thankful to be alive.

These are stories of rising above times—times of great suffering, testing, or trial—times that could have consumed one’s very soul. A rising not of one’s own volition, but specifically because an ingredient was added to the waiting, receptive soul…an agent that urges action and brings hope. We will pause here to honor diverse stories of some rising above times, in A Baking Powder Pause. Thank you for sharing this journey with me! May these words lift you to heights of hope and kindness, reminding you to have a biscuit in your pocket, to give comfort, support, and hope to anyone who suffers—including yourself!

Chapter 1

Biscuits of Life

Yet, O Lord, you are our Father. We are the clay, You are the potter. We are all the work of Your Hand.

—Isaiah 64:8 (NIV)

The Bible provides many examples of the power of bread given by a loving hand. In 1 Kings 19 of the Old Testament of the Bible, we learn of the predicament of the prophet Elijah who is crying out to God to let his life end! He is worn out, hungry, tired, depressed, even running for his life! God sent an angel to comfort, revive, and feed him bread and water. We learn that on the strength of that bread, Elijah then continued his journey for forty days! And when the Lord spoke to Elijah, He did not chastise him for whining, but heard him with loving, deep listening and patiently stayed nearby.

Wesley Hollow was a little pocket in the small town of Traveler’s Rest, in the southeastern mountains of Kentucky, where I spent childhood summers quenching my curiosity and active imagination. I loved watching my great-grandmother Allie (we all called her Mama) cook, especially captivated by her biscuit making. She had a large hand-carved wooden basin (lovingly made by Papa Wesley). The smooth wood cradled the ingredients while her strong and capable hands would push and mold the dough. The smell of those wonderful biscuits in her kindling-fired oven filled the air each morning with a smell that I thought must be like heaven! Mama once told me that baking powder was the magic ingredient that made her large fluffy biscuits possible. It all seemed magical to me…

Mama was a hard worker and a firm believer in daily baking. I didn’t know at the time how poor our family really was, because in that region of Appalachia—in those days—all families led simple, basic lives, and many homes (like theirs) had no electricity. Papa was a leader in the community because he was a carpenter, farmer, and blacksmith with his own blacksmith shop. He also repaired clocks and hand-made many useful tools. So, he serviced nearly everyone in the community one time or another, one way or another. As a child, I couldn’t believe anyone could be older than my mama and papa (whom I thought were older than dirt!), and still be very busy every day. She ironed nearly everything, with an iron that would sit atop her wood-fired kitchen stove. During the summer months when we three children stayed there, and our parents usually returned to our home in Ohio, I really did not miss electricity or running water. The outhouse that Papa had constructed included a lower seat level with a child-size opening, just for us. We still laugh about that!

It took me years to understand the importance of service to others regardless of the person’s age or social status, but I surely was given a model to follow, in Mama and Papa. They had raised my mother because her parents led alcohol-driven lives during the roaring twenties and left Kentucky with their two youngest daughters for city life in Ohio. Mama and Papa’s only son had died of leukemia as a very young man. They had suffered through the Great Depression, saw illness strike and take many loved ones in their region, and had struggled through many hardships. Even as a child, I