(Carol is pictured here as a child in 1948.)
Is there anyone alive
Without a permanent scar
Affecting who they truly are?
Is there anyone alive
Who’s never known pain
Tearing their heart
Leaving a stain?
Is there anyone alive
Who got away Scott-free
From life’s hurts . . .
Not you or me.
But we know the Savior
Who can heal all our loss
Because He gave all
On His Father’s cross.
Is there anyone alive
Whom He won’t receive?
Not one – He’ll save all
Who will trust and believe.
When I write
I feel more
Like myself
Than when I talk.
When I write
I feel released and
Relaxed.
When I talk
I feel constricted,
Restricted,
Conflicted.
When I write,
I feel Myself breathing easily.
When I talk,
I can’t take a deep breath.
Is it any wonder
I enjoy writing
More than talking?
It’s only natural.
I enjoy being released,
Relaxed
And breathing easily
More than being confined,
Restricted,
Conflicted
And unable to take a deep breath.
. . .
Talking demands
I be someone else,
Someone I’m perceived to be,
Someone I’m needed to be,
Someone I’d rather not be,
Someone I’m required to be
In order to put others at ease,
In order to make the least waves,
In order to flow in their stream,
In order to be permitted in their space.
I’m required to wear a certain face
As I talk…
So—I would rather write…isn’t it obvious why?
Even as you read this you say,
“You don’t really feel this way, do
you?”
Isn’t it obvious I do?
Isn’t it obvious
You’d rather not believe me?
Isn’t it obvious your reaction
Is part of why
I’d rather write than talk?
But I just did talk in my loudest voice…
Pen and Ink!
-- Written by Carol E. Crain at 4:00 a.m., February 01, 2001
By Carol E. Crain, written in 2010
Lord, sometimes I'm cast down
Turned inside out and around
Unable to quite see
The way you've planned for me
Unable, Lord, to know
which way my life will go
Then I pause and take a rest
Knowing You will do what's best
And once more I renew
All my faith and trust in You
Lord, sometimes I'm unglued
Often wondering what to do
Sometimes all my peace
vanishes as cares increase
Sometimes I lose sight
of your strength
And wondrous might
When I do, Lord,
Speak to me...
Gently nudge my
Thoughts toward Thee.
When the sun goes down upon my life
And the sunrise seems so very far away,
I just call upon you, Lord, my source of Light,
And then you turn my darkness into day.
When problems surround me, and I'm burdened with care,
Lord you're always with me . . . I know You are there.
If I walk with you, I know you'll see me through,
For no problem in my life is greater than you.
Carol E. Crain is pictured in 1971.
Carol Ellen Williamson Crain, 71, of Taylors, S.C., died on January 11, 2019.
Born in Oakland, California., she grew up in Washington, Pennsylvania, as a daughter of Betty Lee Day and the late Edward Williamson. She was a retired teacher and a member of Sandhills Assembly of God, Southern Pines, N.C.
Also surviving are her husband, Larry Steve Crain of the home, and two daughters: Janelle Lee Smith (Terry) of Taylors, S.C., and Suzanne Crain Miller (Chad) of Raleigh, N.C.
Mrs. Crain affirmed that she “accepted Christ as her Savior” when she was four and a half years old at a “Vacation Bible School held at Broad St. Baptist Church in Washington, PA.” A 1969 Bob Jones Univ. graduate, she taught at Gateway Elementary School in Travelers Rest, S.C., before moving from Greenville, S.C., in 1988 to N.C. She last taught school at Hoffman Elementary, Richmond County, N.C. In recent years, she led inspirational book discussions and mailed letters to many, calling her letters “Envelope Hugs.” An account of her letter-writing can be found at www.carolecrain.blogspot.com. She and her husband moved from Southern Pines, N.C., to Taylors, S.C. in January 2018. After a six-year battle with pulmonary hypertension, she died peacefully at Hospice House of the Carolina Foothills, Landrum, S.C.
Funeral services will be held 12:00 p.m., Wednesday, January 16, 2019 at the Wood Mortuary (Greer, SC), conducted by Rev. Jerry Brown and Rev. Steven Sturm. Burial will follow in Hillcrest Memory Gardens.
Visitation will be held 6:00-8:00 p.m. Tuesday, January 15, 2019 at The Wood Mortuary, Greer, S.C.
The family is at the home. In lieu of flowers, memorials are suggested for Assemblies of God World Missions, 1445 N Boonville Ave., Springfield, MO 65802, or Hospice of the Carolina Foothills, P.O. Box 336, Forest City, NC 28043.
By Carol E. Crain, written August 1, 2011
Throughout my life
I’ve had drawers of emotions –
Emotions I had to stuff,
Put away, not show,
And lock them up.
Then as I lived life later,
I was able to open the drawers
And look at the contents
Little by little – piece by piece.
The drawers are being emptied
more each year.
Some of the things I kept,
And thought I always would,
I see no use for keeping now.
I’m doing a kind of sorting,
Re-filing and re-thinking
About the purpose for keeping
Each memory . . .
Each painful experience
Letting some of them go
Isn’t like saying,
“This didn’t really happen to me –
This wasn’t really done to me,
This didn’t really affect me –
Or wreck me or wrack me,
Rock me or wound me!”
In time, I have seen
That letting some of the drawers’ contents go
Frees me, relieves me, heals me -
To make room for other positive
Experiences in my life.
Some memories are like old blankets
That keep me warm and comfort me.
Those I keep.
Other things in the drawers
Bring up sadnesses and pain,
Loss and damaged emotions.
What to keep? What to let go?
The Lord is helping me know.
Some things I redefine,
Rather than discard.
I look at them with the new light
I have gained through years
Of looking within, without,
With various lights shone
on my drawers’ contents.
Sometimes a spot-light glares.
Other times a soft-veiled light
Shows the finer details,
Rather than glaring, searing pain.
Sometimes I choose to keep
The drawer closed –
Contents kept in the dark,
Because I feel too frail
And not up to looking
At all that’s inside.
Sometimes when someone else’s pain
Is evident enough, I’ve opened my
Drawer and shared certain artifacts
In order to help them be set free
From part of their pain.
As I do, the Lord makes it worth it
To me to share my rips and tears,
My fears and rage and vehicles
Of healing.
Sometimes I want to be all fixed instantaneously healed and whole
And yet, I realize I learn
From the step-by-step journey
More so than if I’d been
Catapulted into instant perfection.
I do value the process, the
Gradual unveiling, un-layering,
Arranging and re-arranging,
Tears and expressed rage,
Sadness for loss and making
Peace with what is left –
What remains.
Sometimes, who I am now
Seems so intertwined
With who I was then.
I find it hard to separate Myself
From that child,
That teen, that person in her
Twenties and thirties.
I can’t really separate myself
into then and now.
I don’t have to be void of
Memories of them
In order to let the Lord
Give me peace now.
I don’t have to have the past
Surgically removed and discarded
In order to feel renewed
And able to be free to embrace now.
I don’t have to gut my life from then
In order to renovate my heart –
Remodel my mind . . .
Renew my spirit now.
As I look back, I’m empowered
To look ahead.
Only as I look back can I
Look ahead.
I don’t have to have amnesia
About my past memories
In order to create new,
Better ones.
Can anyone really understand
All the facets of my being?
No, I can’t expect them to.
They don’t live inside me.
They haven’t witnessed
My days and nights.
Only Jesus and I were there
When each memory was made,
When each rip and tear took place.
He was also there as the stitching
Took place.
He is the ultimate alteration King.
At times, I felt like my
Life’s tapestry was unraveling
And being reworked.
The back of the tapestry has
A variety of threads and knots,
But the scene on the front
Has been forming for almost
Sixty-four years.
The final stitches won’t be finished
Until the last day I’m here
On this earth.
When I see the Lord, I’ll have
A new tapestry of total perfection –
His picture of my life will be
What it was finally meant to be.
I’ll be who He created me to be.
