We’re still rumbling down the country road when Mom starts to wake up. Not surprisingly, she looks startled and afraid. “Where are we?” she demands, clasping my hand so firmly that it actually hurts.
I quickly explain about her being asleep when we arrived in Hochstetler. “Your brother Benjamin picked us up.” I point to the driver of the carriage. “I’m not sure where he’s taking us, though.”
“Benjamin?” She says his name slowly.
“He is your brother, right?” Suddenly I’m worried. What if I’ve let some crazy person kidnap us? But with a horse and carriage?
“Yes, yes.” Mom sits up now, holding on to her head as if she’s getting dizzy. “Oh, dear! Please, can we stop? I feel sick.”
I call out to Benjamin and he stops the horse, turning around to peer inside the carriage.
“My mom’s feeling sick,” I explain to him. “The motion of the carriage makes her dizzy.”
“Oh?” He rubs his chin. “Does she want to walk?”
“No, no, I don’t think so.” I dig through the bag, looking for a water bottle and some saltines. “She’s too weak to walk.”
He gets down and comes around to the side door to peer inside. “Anna?” he says in a gentle voice. “How are you?”
“Oh, Benjamin.” Mom’s voice chokes with emotion. “I’m not very well.”
He nods. “Ja. I can see that. Does the buggy make you sick?”
“Everything makes me sick,” she says as I hand her a saltine. Pointing to her head, she sighs. “I have a sickness that makes me dizzy.”
“Oh.” He frowns. “How will we get you home?”
“Just give us a couple minutes,” I assure him. “Sometimes crackers help. And a little water. Then we can go.” To be safe, I remove one of the emergency barf bags and keep it handy.
“Okay,” Mom declares after a couple of crackers. “Go ahead and drive the buggy, Ben. Don’t worry about me. Just get us there.”
“Ja.” He nods. “You can rest better at home.”
Once again we are moving down the road. I consider offering Mom more diazepam but don’t want her to fall asleep again. “Your brother seems nice,” I say.
“He’s a good guy.”
“Is he Amish?” I ask tentatively.
“Yes.”
“What about the rest of your family?” I ask.
“They are all Amish, Shannon.”
I try not to act as stunned as I feel. “They’re all Amish? Does that make you Amish too?”
“No. I am not Amish. That’s why I left.” She leans back, closing her eyes again.
“Oh.” How am I supposed to wrap my head around this? I want to ask her to explain herself, but I know this isn’t the time or place—I don’t want to stress her out. So we sit there without speaking, hearing only the rumbling of the buggy’s wheels, the rhythmic beat of the horse’s hooves, and an occasional car passing by.
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, Shannon.”
I can’t even think of a response to that. I mean, I appreciate that she’s sorry, but keeping something like this from me? Especially when I always thought that we were so close? Well, it’s more than a little disturbing, and I wonder, when did she intend to tell me?
I think about an hour or more passes before the buggy turns off the main road onto a narrower one. We are deep in farm country now, going past one farm after another, and all of them look strikingly similar. Most have a white two-story farmhouse and a big red barn with numerous outbuildings and tall silos all neatly laid out around it. Because it’s late June, everything growing around these farms looks green and lush, and the landscape has a peaceful, pastoral feeling. Like something you might see in a children’s picture book. Very unreal.
Mom is sitting up straight now. I can tell by her expression that she still feels woozy, but there’s a light of interest in her eyes too. “Up there.” She points to a house and barn coming up on the right. “That is my parents’ home.”
“That was our parents’ home,” Benjamin calls over his shoulder as he turns the horse and buggy onto a gravel road. “Now it is where I and Katrina and the children live.”
“Oh?” Mom looks slightly concerned. “What about Mamm and Daed? Where do they live?”
“In the dawdi house.”
“Dawdi house?” I ask.
“Grandparents’ house,” she explains.
“See that little house on the other side of the barn?” Benjamin points toward a small white structure. “We built that for them not long after Isaac was born.”
“Isaac?” Mom asks him. “I remember your boys Samuel and Joshua. Did you have another son?”
“Ja. Isaac is our third son. He is twenty-three.”
“Born after I left,” Mom says quietly.
“You left twenty-three years ago?” I ask.
“I was fifteen.” She looks up at Benjamin. “So you have three sons?”
“Four sons. Jeremiah is the last son. He’s twenty-one. Then we have two daughters. Grace is nineteen. She got married last month. Our youngest is Rachel. She is seventeen. And that is all.”
“Six children.” Mom sighs loudly. “How nice for you.”
“Six children and three grandchildren. Samuel married Abigail Miller, and they have three girls.”
“Oh my.” Mom looks surprised. “My big brother is a grandpa.”
He slows down the buggy in front of the small white house now. “You will stay with Mamm and Daed,” he declares as we come to a complete stop. “They are expecting you.”
“Oh, Shannon.” Mom reaches for my hand and grips it tightly. “I don’t think I’m ready for this.”
“You and me both,” I nervously tell her.
Benjamin reaches into the buggy to assist her. “Let me help you, Anna.”
After some struggling, together we manage to get Mom out of the buggy and on her feet in the driveway. “Hold on to me,” I tell her as I begin walking us toward the little white house. It looks so tiny, I can’t imagine they will have room for us. Benjamin joins us, carrying all our bags.
“Anna!” The front door pops open and a woman wearing a long, dark blue dress waves toward us. “Welcome!” She has a spring in her step as she hurries to meet us, but when she gets closer, I can see that she is old. Her gray hair is pulled back tightly and hidden under a small white bonnet.
“Mamm!” Mom’s voice cracks with emotion as the older woman wraps her arms around her.
“Oh, Anna!” she exclaims. “You came home. At last you came home.”
Both of them are crying and holding on to each other, and I feel unnecessary and uncomfortable. Ignoring the reunion, Benjamin takes our bags up to the house, and I just stand here, watching.
“Mamm, this is Shannon,” Mom is saying now. “My daughter.”
Suddenly I’m being hugged by the gray-haired woman in the long dress. “Shannon,” she places both her hands on my cheeks, staring directly into my eyes. “Welcome, child.”
“Thank you,” I say as she releases her grasp on my face.
“Shannon is sixteen,” Mom tells her.
“Sixteen?” My grandmother shakes her head with a dismayed look. “All grown up and I am only meeting you now?”
“What should I call you?” I ask her.
“Mammi,” she declares.
“That means grandma,” Mom explains as Benjamin emerges from the little white house.
“I put their things in the other room,” he tells Mammi.
She thanks him and then he excuses himself, saying he has work to finish before the sun goes down.
“Now come inside.” Mammi puts her arm around Mom’s waist. “I know you have been sick, Anna. And you must be weary from travel. You do not look good to me. Too thin. Too pale.”
The inside of the house seems very stark with its wooden floors and plain wooden furnishings, but everything looks clean and neat. However, the space seems very small, and it feels even smaller when all three of us are standing in the living room together. I wonder how there can possibly be room for Mom and me in this miniature home.
“Your room is here.” Mammi opens a door right off of the living room to reveal a very tiny room with a full-sized bed pushed up against one wall.
“Oh?” Mom tosses a concerned look at me as she sits down on the edge of the bed.
“We’ll both sleep here?” I ask Mammi.
“Ja. Is it a problem?”
“Maybe I can sleep on the floor,” I offer halfheartedly.
“You don’t want to sleep with your mamm?”
“She’s been really sick,” I explain. “And I’m a very restless sleeper. I’m afraid I’d disturb her if we shared the same bed.”
Mammi frowns. “Oh . . . ja, ja, I see what you are saying.”
“I don’t mind sleeping on the floor,” I declare weakly. However, the hard wood floor doesn’t look inviting.
Mammi looks uncertain, but then she nods. “Ja, that is fine. You can sleep on the floor. Come with me, Shannon. I will show you where there is more bedding.”
“Maybe you should stay here and rest,” I tell Mom.
“Yes. That might be wise.”
I pull the two spare pillows from the bag. “Maybe we can prop you up with these so your head will be up.”
“Thank you.” She waits for me to arrange the pillows against the wall behind her.
“I’m afraid you’re going to miss your La-Z-Boy,” I tell her.
“What?” Mammi gives Mom an odd look. “You have a lazy boy?”
“It’s a chair, Mamm.” My mom leans back against the pillows and wearily closes her eyes. “A very comfy chair.”
“A chair that she can sleep in,” I explain to Mammi. “It leans back like this.” I use my hand to show her. “It’s called a La-Z-Boy.”
She makes a confused frown. “That does not sound good to me. Laziness is sinful.”
Feeling almost as dazed as Mammi looks, I tell Mom to get some rest and then follow my new grandmother out into the main room where she opens a closet that has a sparse selection of sheets and towels and blankets.
“Tonight you can get what you need for your bed from here,” she says as she closes the door. She opens another door. “This is the bathroom.”
I peek into the tiny and rather odd-looking bathroom. The toilet looks normal enough, but the shower space is very small and the sink has a strange faucet. Still, I don’t feel comfortable questioning every little thing.
“It was your uncle Benjamin who said we must have indoor plumbing,” Mammi tells me. “Jacob—that is your dawdi—he did not want pipes in the house. But Benjamin insisted.” Her gray eyes twinkle when she smiles. “I am glad that he did. Especially in the wintertime.”
Next she shows me another small room with a bed the same size as the one Mom is resting in now. “Your dawdi and me, we sleep here.”
“Dawdi?” I ask. “Does that mean grandparents or grandfather?”
“Ja, ja. It’s both.” She nods as she opens the window to let some air into the stuffy room. I am curious as to why there are no curtains over the windows, but then I am curious about a lot of things. “I forget you have been raised as an Englisher.”
“A what?”
“Englisher,” she says a bit sharply as she turns around to face me. “The ones that live outside and are not Amish. They are Englishers. Your mamm did not tell you about that?”
“No. But she didn’t tell me that she was Amish either.”
“She is not Amish.” Mammi scowls. “She left us.”
“I know,” I say quietly.
Mammi’s dark countenance brightens. “But now our Anna has come home to us. And she has brought you.” She reaches over to touch my hair, twirling it in her fingers. “Such a color.”
“My dad had hair like mine.”
“Amish girls must pin up their hair and cover their heads—when they are out of the house.” She removes some pins from her white bonnet, then slowly lifts it from her head and places it on a shelf by the door. “Our prayer covering is called a kapp,” she tells me. “It is to be treated with respect.”
“Did my mom used to wear these clothes too?” I ask.
“Ja, ja. All the girls here dress like this.” She looks down at my khaki cargo pants, then shakes her head. “English girls who dress like boys. I do not understand.”
Feeling self-conscious, I turn to leave the bedroom. “You have a nice house,” I tell her when we are in the living room again. It isn’t a heartfelt compliment, but I can’t think of anything else to say.
“Our home is small and humble, but it is enough.” Her stern countenance softens again. “But you have not seen the best room yet.”
“What’s that?”
“The kitchen.” She tilts her head to the other end of the house.
To my surprise, the kitchen is by far the largest part of the house. But it is unlike any kitchen I’ve ever seen. The big sink has what looks like a pump for a faucet, and there are no modern appliances whatsoever. In the center of the room is a long, wooden table with a chair at the end and a bench on either side. “Looks like you can have lots of people for dinner here.”
“Ja. We always have plenty of room at our table.” She goes over to open the door on an old-fashioned black stove. I notice some pieces of wood and wood shavings stacked neatly but am surprised to see Mammi striking a match and lighting the stove.
“You’re making a fire on a hot day like this?” I ask her.
“I can’t cook supper without a fire in the stove.”
“You cook in that thing?”
“Ja.”
I look around the kitchen now, remembering something I’ve read or heard before. “You don’t have electricity, do you?”
“No. No electrical wires can come into our homes.”
“What do you use for lights?” I ask.
She points to a kerosene lamp hanging on a hook by the sink. “This is good light. Also candles. And we have some battery lights too.”
“So batteries are okay?”
“Ja. Just no wires to the house.”
I wonder how I will manage to charge things like my iPad and phone. “What about phones?” I ask. “My neighbor said you have a phone. She gave me a number. Is it a cell phone?”
“Benjamin put a phone into the barn. It is to be used for business. Since the wires don’t come to the house, it is allowed.”
“Allowed?” I consider this. “So the Amish have a lot of rules?”
“We have our Ordnung.”
“Ordnung?”
“Ja. Our Ordnung lights the path to a godly life.”
So many questions are running through my mind now, but I don’t even know where to begin. I feel like I’m visiting a foreign country.
“Would you like to help me make supper?”
“Sure,” I tell her. “Although I’m not much of a cook.”
Her brow creases. “Your mamm did not teach you to cook?”
“Not really.”
She says a word in another language, but it doesn’t sound like a happy word. “Get the milk,” she tells me as she sets a big kettle on top of the stove.
“Milk?” I glance around the kitchen. “Do you have a refrigerator?”
“It’s out there.” She tips her head toward a screen door that appears to lead to a back porch.
Curious if it’s an electric appliance, I go out to the porch, and sure enough, there’s an old-fashioned looking refrigerator. Inside of it I find what looks and smells like a pitcher of milk, so I carry it back to the kitchen.
“I thought you didn’t have electricity in the house,” I say as I hand the pitcher to her. “What about that refrigerator?”
“It runs on propane.”
“Ah.” I nod as if that makes sense. The truth is, I’ve never heard of such a thing.
But I think I’m starting to get it. These people are green. They like keeping life simple, and they obviously know how to live off the grid. I must admit that as I work with Mammi in the kitchen—asking questions and hearing some rather interesting answers—it is all becoming pretty intriguing. There’s no denying that this kind of life has an appealing sort of charm. I’m wondering more than ever why my mother ever left this place.