Growing Up Amish - A Memoir Part 5

As eight oaclock approached, my friends and I often filed back into the house early, so as to grab the treasured back bench against the wall. There were two reasons for this: Wead have a wall to lean against, and we could get away with more monkeyshines. Bloomfield didnat use tables at the singings, just rows of benches. A row of boys, a row of girls, a row of boys, a row of girls.

At 8:00 sharp, the first song was announced. As the minutes crept by, we sang and sang. It seemed to me sometimes, as the harmony swelled and my spirit soared, that I could never leave, never forsake this ancient heritage, this priceless legacy. That no sacrifice would be too great to draw these things inside and keep them in my heart.

Shortly before nine thirty someone announced and led the parting song. After its last notes faded, the young men got up from the benches and walked out single file. The singing was over for one more week.

We milled about outside. Socialized and chatted for a while. Those who were dating were the first to hurry away. In Bloomfield, courting couples tended to leave posthaste for the girlas house, because dates were decreed over at midnight.

Then, one by one, my friends and I hitched up our horses and left, a long convoy of buggies with blinking orange lights.

Gradually, even more families arrived. Bloomfield was suddenly the ahota place to be. And soon enough, the single district was bulging at the seams.

It had gotten too big.

And that meant only one thing: It was time to divide it.

Every Amish district must have its own contingent of at least two preachers and a deacon. A newly created district meant there would have to be ordinations to fill these positions.

And so it was decided. A dividing line separating the two districts was drawn, and an ordination was scheduled. As the day drew nearer, the young married men in the community grew increasingly somber and burdened.

Church was at our house the Sunday of the ordination. The winds whipped and swirled that afternoon, and storm clouds gathered. Inside, a large group of people were sitting in row upon row of wooden benches. We were having a Communion service, or aBig Church,a as we called it. It was an all-day affair.

But this particular service was different, because at the end, a new preacher would be ordained. Every corner of the house pulsed with palpable tension.

Near the close of the service, Bishop George, a slight, bald man with a long gray beard, stood to recite the rules of ordination. He explained that he and the other preachers would retire to a separate side room (which happened to be my parentsa bedroom). Then one preacher would open the door a crack and place his ear in the opening. Members would vote by whispering their choices into the preacheras ear, and a tally would be taken. Any married man with three or more votes would be in the lot.

With that, Bishop George and the preachers retreated to my parentsa room and closed the door, and the voting began. The older men went first. Walked up to the door, paused briefly, then whispered their choices before returning to their seats. After that, according to age, younger married men, then young unmarried men, married women, and finally, single women.

Not being a member, I didnat vote. My buddies and I took a break from our normal wisecracking and watched somberly. No surly antics. No smart-aleck actions. No smirks. The air was heavy, oppressive.

The voting took awhile. Then, after the last member had voted, the door shut on the cloistered preachers while they tallied the votes. Minutes pa.s.sed. Then Deacon Menno popped out of the side-room door, gathered five songbooks, and popped back in. Everyone pretended not to notice, but all eyes took a careful count: five songbooks. There would be five men in the lot.

Minutes later, the preachers filed out in somber procession and took their seats on the bench along the wall. The tension escalated. Deacon Menno arranged the songbooks on a little table. Each book was tied shut with a thin white string.

Then Bishop George stood and cleared his throat. aThere are five brothers in the lot,a he announced in his high, squeaky voice. aThey are . . .a and he slowly, concisely p.r.o.nounced the five names. Each man sagged visibly as he heard his name.

Then slowly, one by one, they got up and walked the long path to the table. Each man chose a book and then took a seat on the bench before the table. Five books. Five men. Everyone waiting.

After a short prayer, Bishop George slowly approached the bench where the five men sat. He took the book from the first, untied the white string, and opened it.

Nothing.

The first man almost collapsed with relief.

Bishop George then took the book from the next manas trembling hands. Fumbled with the string. Opened the book.

Again, nothing.

The three remaining men viewed the situation with increasing alarm and accelerating heartbeats. No one moved. No one breathed. Original odds were one to five. Now they were one to three. Bishop George approached the third man and held out his hand. Took the book. Untied the string. Opened it.

Again, nothing.

Now it was down to one of the remaining two. Two young men. What pa.s.sed through their minds at that instant remains known only to them and G.o.d. They sat there, frozen. Mercifully, Bishop George did not prolong their agony. He approached the fourth man and held out his hand. Took the book. Untied the string. Opened it.

Inside the book, on page 770, was a little slip of white paper. Bishop Georgeas hand shook slightly as he took the little slip of paper. He looked down at the young man before him and pointed his right index finger, signifying, You are the one.

The young man struggled to his feet. And there, before us all, Bishop George ordained him, proclaiming him a minister of the gospel from that day forth until his death.

The young man briefly lost control of his emotions; his body shook with quick, choppy sobs. But just as quickly, he recovered and stood there quietly, his head bowed, as he accepted the office and the duties he would henceforth carry.

The other men in the lot, vastly relieved at the outcome, now cl.u.s.tered around the young man who had just been ordained and comforted him. The preachers, too, all of them, came and welcomed him into their midst.

Then it was over. The congregation was dismissed. The young man sat down on the bench. He looked around him, at all the shadowy figures meshing in a hazy blur.

He was now a preacher.

Until his death.

His life would never be the same. Never.

Nor, for that matter, would my familyas. The young man ordained that day was my oldest brother, Joseph.

And thatas how it all comes down. An Amish man gets up in the morning, a regular member of the church, goes to the service with his wife and children, and returns home that evening, ordained to the ministry for the rest of his life.

A preacher.

Lots of work for no pay.

Just like that.

The process is based on the New Testament account of the choosing of Matthias by lot to replace Judas after he betrayed Jesus. The whole thing takes less than an hour. There is no counseling session, no discussion with the ordained to see whether or not he even has a calling. Itas the only system the Amish have ever used.

It has its flaws, but overall, it works amazingly well. A quiet young man who has never had much to say is ordained, and one month later, with no training whatsoever, gets up to preach for the first time. Itas sink or swim, and somehow, he swims. And over the course of many years, he develops into a gifted speaker and a powerful preacher.

Of course, sometimes the reverse is also true. Iave heard many a sermon from preachers who could not speak publicly to save their lives. Men who spent the first ten minutes of their sermons bemoaning the aheavy burdena of their calling. Men who, in my opinion, should never have been ordained. But the lot chose them, just as it chose Matthias. Granted, nothing more is ever written of Matthias, other than the fact that he was ordained by lot. So perhaps he wasnat that great a speaker either.

My brother Joseph, it turned out, was a swimmer. He soon developed into the premier preacher in Bloomfield. When he stood to preach, the congregation sat alert, absorbed in his message, and much to the childrenas delight, he always stopped on time.

For me, the other preachers suddenly seemed more human, because now my brother was one of them. And to Josephas credit, although he strongly disapproved of my subsequent life choices, he was always there for me through the turmoil that would characterize the next ten years.

11.

Itas a law of human nature. The young will defy and test the previous generationas boundaries and push them to the limits. It has always been so and will likely always be.

This is particularly true in the Amish culture, with its austere lifestyle, where the rules prohibit all things modern and, therefore, sinful: cars, radios, and television.

Very few young Amish kids with a spark of life and an ounce of willpower will simply accept their leadersa admonitions not to touch aunclean things.a Most need to experiment, experience, and decide for themselves.

My friends and I were no different.

There were six of us.

Marvin and Rudy Yutzy were my first and closest friends in Bloomfield. They were first cousins and had known each other all their lives. I was the new guy on their turf, but they gladly made room for me.

Rudy, the youngesta"and yet somehow the tallesta"was the orator of the group. He could weave and st.i.tch and thread the most fascinating, vivid tales from the most mundane, everyday events. No detail was too small. No comment too obscure. He included and expounded on everything in fantastic, colorful narratives that flowed in a continual rolling stream.

Marvin was a bit more reserved. He was intelligent, thoughtful, and observant, with a keen, dry sense of humor. He could deadpan a joke and move on before the true incisive humor of his observation ever hit you.

Then there were the Herschberger brothersa"Willis and Verna"who moved to Bloomfield from the large, troubled settlement of Arthur, Illinois, about a year after we arrived. They were tough, cynical, talkative, friendly, and extremely knowledgeable in the ways of the world.

Mervin Gingerichas family had been one of the first to move to Bloomfield. Mervin was my agea"a muscular hunk of a kid with a ready smile and a round, perpetually red face. His father was Bishop George Gingerich, so his family had excellent standing in the community.

Me? Well, Iam not quite sure where I fit in. I was the one who brooded and mulled things over. Or perhaps overmulled is more accurate, if thatas a word. I was the one who spoke the occasional comment that made absolutely no sense to the others. Tall, skinny, a beanpole of a kid with a ready smile, I was intensely loyal to my friends.

The six of us met in Bloomfield, and somehow we were drawn to one another. We were intelligent and hungry for knowledge. We read voraciously, mostly trashy bestsellersa"picked up at yard sales and used-book storesa"that we kept carefully stashed under our mattresses or in little nooks about the house.

We were an exclusive group, a tight nucleus, huddled together and protecting one another from the storms that occasionally engulfed us.

Looking back, I canat remember any time in my life when I felt closer to a group of friends than I did to those five guys.

Things were pretty calm at first. We were, for the most part, decent kids. Bloomfield had no wild youth.

Sad to say, this placid state would not survive for long. It couldnat. Because we harbored in our hearts the seeds of rebellion. Or maybe it was the seeds of life, of adventure, of freedom. Perhaps it was a little of both.

We wanted to experience the things we saw around us, things outside our sheltered world. Things wead read about and heard of, things wead seen others do, things that happened in other communities.

We were young and full of spirit.

We were sixteen.

Sixteen.

The gateway to manhood in Amish culture.

And sixteen is a hard, bright line. One day youare fifteen and a child. The next morning youare sixteen and a man. Well, maybe not a man, but something more than a child, something more than you were the day before.

And the six of us? Well, we were simply spirited youth. That doesnat excuse a lot of the stuff we pulled off, but who can instruct a pack of youth who band together in revolt? At that age? No one.

And no one did.

We knew instinctively that there was so much more beyond our closed and structured world, so much just waiting for us to grasp and feel and taste and absorb.

But it wasnat only that the outside world drew us. We were also repelled by what we saw and heard around us every day. Most of the adultsa"those securely anch.o.r.ed in the faitha"didnat seem any too happy in their daily lives. In fact, they were mostly downright grumpy. There was little in our own world that attracted us, made us stop and think, Thatas what I want. To live like that.

We were stuck in a stifling, hostile culture consisting of myriad complex rules and restrictions. More things were forbidden than were allowed. And thatas not to mention the drama, the dictatorial decrees, the strife among so-called brothers, and the seemingly endless emotional turmoil that resulted. We had seen and lived it all.

And even though it would have been difficult, if not impossible, for us to articulate, there burned inside each of us a spark of deep desire and longing not to be different from the outside world. From English society. Not to wear galluses and those awful homemade, barn-door pants. Not to have haircuts that looked as if someone had snipped around the edges of a bowl upended on our heads.

We longed to drive a car or truck, not a horse and buggy. We hungered for freedom, real freedom, unrestricted by a host of arcane laws based on tradition.

And we knew that when our fathers were young, they had done the very things they were now denying us. Not that they ever admitted any such thing. But we knew. And they should have known that we knew.

Donat do as I did is what we heard. Do as I say.

There was no tolerance for anything less than that, no attempt to consider our perspectives. No respect, no communication, no honesty. And that simply could not work in the age-old conflict between fathers and sons. Not when the sons have a shred of spirit.

And so, it was with that state of mind that I officially entered my Rumspringa years.

12.

Rumspringa. That misp.r.o.nounced word popularized by the 2002 doc.u.mentary film Devilas Playground, which, to be fair, was a pretty accurate depiction in many ways. The term Rumspringa simply means arunning around.a All Amish youth run around. Thatas what they do after turning sixteen, when they are considered adults. Run with the youth and attend singings and social gatherings.

But if someone asked me what percentage of Amish youth arun wilda and touch and taste the unclean things of the outside world, either while they are at home or after leaving, my guess would be 20 to 25 percent. But thatas just a guess. It might be close; it might not. Rumspringa varies greatly from community to community. Some smaller communities have almost no wild youth. In larger communities, wild youth are much more common.

Despite the fact that the producers of the doc.u.mentary had unprecedented access to northern Indianaas wild Amish youth, Devilas Playground left viewers with a huge misconception: the belief that the Amish actually allow their youth a time to explore, to run wild, to live a mainstream lifestyle. To decide whether or not they really want to remain Amish.

Iam not saying that never happens. It probably does, in some rare individual families. But church policy never approves it. It never has been that way and never will be. In fact, the Amish church does everything in its power to maintain its grip on the youth, including applying some of the most guilt-based pressure tactics in existence anywhere in the world. After all, thereas no sense encouraging young people to taste the outside world, because thereas a good chance they might not returna"regardless of how good their intentions might have been when they left.

The smaller communities keep a tight grip on their youth. Or try to. Thatas why theyare smaller communities, because the people there usually fled the larger settlements to get away from the wild-youth practices.

In Aylmer, if you looked sideways the wrong way, the leaders would whack you hard. Shave your beard? The deacon would be knocking on your door. Smoking, drinking, partying, or carousing? Absolutely unheard of in all its history.

Bloomfield used to have a similar iron grip on things, until six young men shattered the old molds and forged their own way.

And things have never been quite the same since.

We didnat consider ourselves awild.a In fact, we scorned anyone who consciously tried to be. And we didnat necessarily think we were cool. But we were, at least in our own restricted little world.

We simply did the ordinary, acceptable things that all Amish kids do.

Avid hunters, we tramped through cornfields and pastures in pursuit of pheasant and quail. And in season, we hunted deer from before dawn until dusk. Our successes were rare but greatly savored. The stories of our great feats were told and retold, and grew more fantastic with each telling.