The Haystack Prayer Meeting
By Hal Haralson, Austin, TX
There were no caves to explore where I grew up. The sandy Texas plain north of Loraine was typical of West Texas.
There is only one "mountain" rising above that plain. Lone Wolf Mountain proudly bore the title of "the highest peak in Mitchell County."
Visible for miles, it rose to a majestic 800 feet above sea level. The air was no thinner on its peak than on the sandy soil below.
Sand-lots of sand-produced tumble weeds, cat-claw bushes, mesquite trees, and wild plum thickets.
There was a huge plum thicket on the dry creek in our pasture. The tart wild plums produced some of the best jelly I have ever tasted. Neighbors came to our farm to gather wild plums on the "halves:" a bucket for them and a bucket for us. Ours was left on the porch. No signs posted. No instructions. It was the unspoken courtesy of West Texas.
The plum thicket covered nearly an acre on the creek. Under the matted limbs were trails carved by small animals. Secret places never exposed to the sun. "West Texas caves."
Our neighbors` daughter was six and I was seven. There were no boys in her family, no girls in mine. In one of those "caves" we explored the mystery of what makes boys different from girls. The game was called "doctor." We took turns being the examining physician.
We both emerged with childhood curiosity satisfied. We might have sung with Peggy Lee, "Is That All There Is?" Wiser, we both went home.
She "confessed" to her mother, who cried in anger on our front porch as she told my mother of the secret tryst, and of her daughter`s contaminated innocence and admitted guilt.
I heard the car drive off.
Mother entered my room. "Come with me Hal Holmes."
Whenever she used both of my names, I knew I was in trouble.
We went past the windmill, past the barn to the haystack. Mother dropped to her knees in the hay and pointed for me to do the same.
She prayed and confessed my "sin" to God. She told God how disappointed she was in me; how she had prayed while pregnant with me as she had walked the dusty road; how in the pasture she had dedicated to God the child she carried. She asked God for forgiveness for herself as a mother for failing to raise her son as God would have him to be.
She left me at the haystack.
Deep in the recesses of my seven-year-old mind I vowed never to disappoint her-or God-again.
I did not understand the impact of this experience until sixty years later. Why then? Maybe it was the cool mountain air of Taos, New Mexico. Perhaps it was the beauty of the 200-year-old Mable Dodge Luhan Conference Center where I was participating in a writing conference led by Paula D`Arcy. Conceivably it was a combination of these physical stimuli coupled with the words of this inspirational woman. Paula honestly and openly shared her remembrance of the death of her husband and two-year-old daughter Sarah. The tragedy had occurred twenty years before when a drunken driver going 90 miles per hour struck their car. Her pain became her gift . . . her journal, published as Song for Sarah, sold 250,000 copies in the first six months.
My recent read of Parker Palmer`s book Let Your life Speak, which suggests that many of us lead desperate lives trying to be who we think others want us to be, helped to prompt my insight. The intermingling of the words of Palmer and D`Arcy produced a personal revelation as clear as if my soul had received a CAT scan. I had not recognized this truth before: after making that haystack vow I had spent the next twenty years living so that I would not disappoint anyone. By trying to please everyone else I had denied the existence of my true self. The refusal to acknowledge this led to deep depression.
There was only one escape from this painful journey. End it!
SAN ANTONIO STATE HOSPITAL ADMISSION SHEET
Date: Dec. 16, 1962 White male, Age 27.
Name: Hal Holmes Haralson
Reason for admission: "Failed suicide attempt"
After three sessions the psychiatrist showed me the way out: "Hal, if you don`t leave the ministry, I`m of the opinion that you will take your life or spend it in a mental institution."
I knew that neither of those endings was what God wanted for me. I made the decision that I had avoided for years. I left the ministry. I wrote to the church in Loraine, Texas, that had ordained me a Baptist minister-"I want my ordination revoked."
The wrote back: "We don`t know how to do that . . . we`ve never done it before."
I responded: "You`re Baptist, vote on it." They did!
I had been diagnosed as being bipolar. I began a new journey-a lifetime managing bipolar illness-thirty years medicated with lithium. In Taos, for the first time in 68 years, I saw the relevance of the "haystack prayer meeting." It was the fulcrum on which the rest of my life had balanced. But ultimately my "mental illness" became my gift. Like Paula D`Arcy, I shared my story with others.
After leaving the hospital I spent six years in the world of commerce. Then I sold my business interests. I struggled with my bipolar illness.
I was thirty-three. What could I do the rest of my life? I was free to do anything that I wanted. I needed a profession where my particular form of mental illness would not be a handicap.
I decided to become a lawyer. In 30 years of law practice no one ever noticed the difference.
I left the ministry to become a minister. My new "ministry" was telling my story.
My journey is described in the poem that I wrote following the insight I gained from Father Keith Hosey, the only Catholic priest that I know. God used this Catholic priest to hear the confession of a former Baptist preacher:
CONTEMPLATION
I sought God as a child.
"Now I lay me down to sleep."
Simple trust.
I found Him there . . .
But sought Him more.
I sought God as a youth.
Frantic searching.
Fearful surrender.
I found Him there . . .
But sought Him more.
I sought God in His Word.
Instruction. Forgiveness.
Comfort. Guidance.
I found Him there . . .
But sought Him more.
I sought God in others.
Shared love. Pain.
Searching. Joy.
I found Him there . . .
But sought Him more.
I sought God in worship.
Broken bread. Spoken Word.
Songs of praise.
I found Him there . . .
But sought Him more.
I sought God within.
"You`re home, My child."
"My home," He said.
"You`ve found the door
I thank God for my journey, for loving me enough to give His Son that I might have eternal life. I thank God for allowing me to find Judy Christian, my wife, who has shared this journey for forty-eight years. And I even thank God for my mother`s prayer at the haystack.
As I write this the words of two hymns that I sang as a child come to mind. The first is Rescue the Perishing. One of the verses says: "Down in the human heart, Crushed by the tempter, Feelings lie buried that Grace can restore."
The other, It Is Well With My Soul": "When peace like a river attendeth my way, When sorrows like sea billows roll, Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say:
It is well, it is well with my soul."
Amen.
