By Marianne Wood

Once upon a time, I pretended to be a pioneer woman named Sallie Reynolds Matthews. 

As an educator at The Grace Museum long ago, I was asked to prepare an inspiring activity for young girls based on a local heroine. In my eagerness to know more about this female legend from up the street in Shackelford County, I hungrily researched her life for a reenactment in the museum’s loggia. My notes for the presentation reminded me that I dressed as Sallie would have in 1870: in a poke bonnet and a cotton dress.

Performed in the first person, I gave my audience of Girl Scouts a patchwork sampling of a girl’s life as she grew into womanhood on the Indian frontier. The girls learned that Sallie came of age as machines took over the streets and signal fires gave way to radio waves. I shared this quote from the Foreward in her book Interwoven, A Pioneer Chronicle, giving them a brief view of her spiritual mindset.

 “…I have been blessed far beyond my deserts. I realize there is nothing in me to merit the wonderful blessings I have had. Surely goodness and mercy have followed me all the days of my life, and I am truly thankful to the Giver of every good and perfect gift.”

She declares this despite some of the hair-raising passages that follow in the book. At least one may cause you to reach for your head to shield it from scalping. Yes, perhaps I should have put “spoiler alert” ahead of this paragraph!

Sallie’s life contains a fascinating tale of courage, ingenuity, and perseverance set in a rugged landscape. Family, friends, and faith enriched and sustained her. When I completed my research, which extended beyond her autobiography, I felt like I’d gained a close ally for life—someone to inspire me. Recently, I have discovered a beautiful extension of her life in getting to know her great-grandson, Watt Matthews Casey, Jr. He now tends the land she loved.

Life teems with connections, extensions, discoveries, and hints that God sees us in our brokenness, challenges, joys, and losses. I am pondering this as I am recovering from a demanding but satisfying jam-packed trip to Philadelphia to visit family and friends.

As I reviewed our trip, I quickly regarded the journey north as ribbons of layers: hard, hard, then sweet, sweet, heartbreaking, and breathtaking. That sort of thing. But a wise and knowledgeable friend recently said, “No, I believe you have been interweaving these experiences.” She is right. That is the better picture of life: a tapestry.

Sallie’s Interwoven refers to two families settling on a frontier. Her story illustrates the realities of living through all manner of challenges. Yet her life sparkles with gifts of grace. I liken them to beautiful threads. Some of the ones in my tapestry have names on them. You know who you are.

As I look back over that hard, sweet, heartbreaking, and breathtaking week, I take encouragement from the shiny bits of God’s presence. He made himself known by weaving care through the hospitality of dear friends and through activities that reunited us with people with whom we forged deep kinship during dark days in 2023. 

Our imagined weaving brightens as we recall the embrace of little arms, quick rapport with a new friend, and the surprise of getting acquainted with a man seated next to me on our airplane ride home: a genial physician who relishes his work fighting cancer. 

We have a God who sees us. Sallie knew it, too. Thanks be to El Roi.

Marianne Wood works as an editorial assistant and researcher for Bill Wright