That afternoon not long after lunch the cleanup crew left. The Lapp family was taking a breather. John and Jim sat on the porch steps. Each leaned against a post, relaxing for the first time in several days. The Yoder brothers along with Noah and Daniel sat in the grass, backs against the shade tree. In the living room, Hal and Nora leaned back on the couch with their eyes closed. Emma rocked slowly in the rocker.
Finally, Emma broke the silence. “We need to do something special this afternoon.”
“Like what, dear,” Nora said, opening her eyes. “I’m about specialed out at this moment.”
“How about going on a picnic?” Emma suggested. “We can see if the men and the boys would like to fish in the pond?”
“That sounds like a great idea,” Hal said. “Go ask your father. I’m sure he will say yes. Mom and I will get busy gathering the food.”
“Where do you picnic around here?” Nora asked Hal as she followed her daughter to the kitchen.
“We have our own special spot on this farm, don’t we, Emma?”
Emma smiled as she answered, “Jah, we can walk to it.” She went outside. “Papa, we want to do something special while Dawdi and Mammi are here. How about we have a picnic and go fishing this afternoon?”
“What you think, Jim? You like to fish?” John asked.
“Why, fishing is my middle name. Let’s go,” Jim said enthusiastically.
Emma spoke loudly through the screen door. “They are agreed.” She turned back to the men. “We will be along in a while with a picnic lunch to eat in the grove. I will bring a can for the worms. Make sure to get a pole for me while you are at it. ”
“I will.” John walked over to the boys, “Did you hear that? We’re going fishing. Boys, bring a shovel to dig some worms. I’ll get the poles.”
In a short time, the women carried the dish towel bundles out to the red wagon. Emma pulled the wagon as they walked down the lane. Hal pointed across the pasture. “Mom, see that grove of trees. That’s our picnic grounds. The children keep a big area in the middle cleared so it’s like a park. And the cows graze on the grass so it’s always short. Makes for a pleasant spot to picnic and camp out.”
“Sounds like it as long as you watch where you step,” Nora said, grinning as she stepped around a fresh cow pile.
Emma giggled, tugging on the wagon with one hand and holding a can of worms in the other. “We do not think to tell the boys that often enough. Going bour feesich anywhere outside of the yard can be a problem when we have die coos loose.” She stopped walking. “Hallie, are you limping?”
“A little. I don’t have these new shoes broke in yet. I think I’ve blistered both heels,” Hal groaned.
“It is about time you did what all the rest of us do. Take your shoes off and go barefoot in the summer,” Emma told her. “Before you put those shoes back, put some Band-Aids on your heels until you get the shoes broke in.”
“Sounds like a plan to me,” Hal said as she slipped out of her shoes and leaned them against a fence post in the lane fence. “Now I’ll be able to find them when we come back tonight. You want to take your shoes off, Mom?”
“No, I’ll pass. My feet are too tender to walk barefoot,” declared Nora.
“Take the wagon, Hallie.” Emma handed over the tongue and took off ahead of the women. “I am going to find where Papa laid my fishing pole.”
As Emma trotted away, Hal chuckled. “Emma loves to fish.”
“Have fun and catch more than the men. I’d like fried fish for lunch tomorrow,” Nora called after her. Quietly, she said, “You have wedded a lovely family, Hal.”
“I did, didn’t I? I feel so lucky to have them.” Hal grew quiet for a moment, listening to the wagon wheels squeak through the grass while worries raced through her mind. “Mom?”
“Yes, Dear.”
“Does it seem like to you I’ve changed a whole lot lately?”
“No, you are still our Hallie. You can’t change from the person you are just because you dress differently.” Once the words were out of her mouth, Nora hesitated and looked at her daughter. “Oh dear, I didn’t mean that about your dressing differently in a bad way.”
“It’s all right. I understood what you meant.”
Nora questioned, “What brought this on anyway?”
Hal looked serious as she studied her mom. “Something Margaret Yoder said when Dad and John were clowning around with their hats. She said they were trying to bring me out of the serious Amish person I had become back to the fun loving person they had always known. That surprised me. I didn’t realize I’d changed.”
“You haven’t. Not really. I think you’re just trying very hard to be the person you think the Amish community will want you to be. You are trying too hard to get accepted by everyone. Take my advice. Just be yourself. The person they have grown to know and love. The rules about what you can and can’t do as an Amish person will come naturally after a while. You won’t be so worried about making a mistake.” Nora grinned at her daughter. “Which should be some easier for you to do than it is your father and me since you don’t have Aunt Tootie giving you lessons.”
Hal blushed as she realized her mother had read her mind about Aunt Tootie’s book of Amish customs. “Oh, Mom. You’re always so wise. You know me pretty well,” Hal said, tugging on the wagon handle to start it rolling again.
“I should. I’ve had lots of years to get used to you. You’re new to the Amish community but that will change, too. Soon nothing you do will surprise the Amish once they get to know you. If it does, they will take it as a fluke of nature ingrained into Nurse Hal’s character,” Nora said with a tongue in cheek look on her face.
Hal stared at her mother. “Thanks a lot, Mom. I think.”
“You’re welcome. Now we best get ready for this picnic before it’s time for the hungry fishermen to gang up on us,” Nora said, picking up her pace.
They passed through the outer line of trees, filled with birds lazily calling to each other and by the blackberry thicket, Hal stopped and looked around. “This is the place. We need to pick up some sticks for a fire from under the trees. Roasting hot dogs and marshmallows will be a nice change after all the cooking we’ve done lately. I’m glad I bought an extra bag of potato chips last time I got groceries. This will be a perfect picnic.”
“You’re right, but it’s all of us together, talking and enjoying each other’s company, that makes the picnic special.” Nora headed off toward the trees one way while Hal went the other direction. With an arm load of sticks, Nora started back to the clearing. Her toe connected with something that didn’t budge in the tall grass. She snapped, “Ouch!” When she staggered, she dropped her sticks which clattered across the ground. Nora put her hand up against a tree trunk and managed to stay upright. All the noise brought Hal running to check on her.
“Mom, are you all right?”
“I am now except for a smarting toe. I thought I was going to be on my face for a second. I’m sure glad I had my shoes on. What did I stub my toe on?” Nora pulled apart the grass and saw the small wooden cross with the word Diane on it. Another cross was next to that one with Patches written on it. “What have the Lapps got here? A private family cemetery?”
“Well, it is and it isn’t. There is a cemetery for the district that most of the Amish are buried in. That is where Diane Lapp is buried. Although I’ve seen a few private family burial places scattered about. Let me help you gather up your sticks. Once we get the wood piled, I’ll tell you the stories about the crosses while we have the grove to ourselves,” Hal said.
The afternoon passed quickly while Hal caught her mother up on the death of Patches, the family dog and how saddened they had been. She told her mother she felt the only way to make the children feel some closure about Patches death was to bury him with a private funeral.
More complicated was the story about what was under the wooden cross with Diane Lapp’s name on it. Hal made her mother promise not to mention she knew the story to any of the Lapps before she began. While the women talked, whoops of joy when a fish landed on the bank and loud teasing about who had the biggest catch so far drifted to them from the pond bank.
Later that afternoon, John and his boys trudged toward the barn to milk. Emma, Levi, Mark and Jim continued to fish. Hal listened for the milking machine’s rumble to stop. When the barn was silent, she walked to the edge of the clearing. John and the boys were headed to the picnic grove. Hal lit the little pile of dead leaves she pushed under the sticks. In minutes, the camp fire burned brightly and fast consumed the supply of dried wood Nora and Hal gathered. Hal and her mother went back among the trees to pick up more sticks. Hal threw her arm full on the fire. Nora dumped her sticks nearby for later and went to the edge of the clearing to yell it was time to eat. When John and Jim arrived, they fished their pocket knives out and cut some green sticks to use for roasting the hot dogs and marshmallows.
Nora said to no one in particular, “Were the fish biting today?”
“Jah,” Emma said smugly. “Very gute.”
“Mostly on Emma’s pole,” grunted Noah.
“One of us had to have good luck, Grandson or we’d not have anything to eat tomorrow,” Jim teased, elbowing Noah in the ribs.
“I agree with Noah. Emma is too lucky at fishing,” Levi teased, winking at Jim.
Emma blushed because of the off handed praises and ducked her head.
Soon everyone lit into the browned hot dogs in slices of Emma’s homemade bread and bowls of chips while they sat around the blazing campfire.
The wind picked up as they put marshmallows on their sticks. The campfire flames wavered back and forth as the marshmallows swelled and browned, mesmerizing them all.
Sitting between Noah and Daniel, Jim suggested as he nibbled on his roasted treat, “Next time it rains, you two ought to get out after dark to pick up night crawlers. Those worms are easier to bait a hook with then the little red worms you dig.”
Daniel licked the excess goo off his stick and grumped, “We never know when we’re going fishing after a rain.”
“Don’t matter,” Jim replied. “The worms will keep for a while until you ready to fish.”
Noah shook his head. “Not for us. We’ve tried, and the nightcrawlers always died.”
“Did you put them in a cool place?” Jim asked.
“Nah, I don’t think we have one,” Noah said.
“Yes, you do. The root cellar is a perfect place to keep them,” Jim said. “You have to put them in shredded newspapers and dirt. Make sure to sprinkle them with water often and feed them.”
“Feed them?” Daniel snickered.
Emma grew interested. “What do nightcrawlers eat, Dawdi?”
“They eat all the stuff you have on hand. It’s chicken feed, oatmeal, brown sugar and powdered milk. Mix a cup of each thing together and keep in a covered container. An old oatmeal box works well. Sprinkle some of the feed on top the worm bedding once a month. Why you might even be able to go into the nightcrawler selling business if you take care of all the worms you can pick up,” Jim encouraged.
Nora perked up. The grumbling of distant thunder was just a little louder than the talking and laughter. “Listen, does that sound like a storm coming? Or am I hearing things?”
The others stopped talking and strained to listen.
John said, “You are not hearing things. Look through the trees at how gloomy it is in the pasture. We better go for the house, or we will be soaked. Levi and Mark, you head for home before the storm hits.”
“Mom and Emma, you gather up our things. I’ll go back with the boys,” Hal said. “And gather up Mark’s clothes.”
She rushed across the pasture with the boys. By the time Levi had their horse hooked to the buggy, Mark was waiting, his arms filled with freshly washed clothes.
As the boys climbed into the buggy, Hal said, “Next time you come to visit, you can bring back Daniel’s clothes.”
Hal and the Lapp brothers waved at the Yoder brothers as they went out the driveway. Hal sat down on the top porch step where she could watch the growing storm cloud while she waited for the others to make it back from the picnic grove. Daniel plopped down beside her.
As he headed around the side of the house, Noah said, “Think I’ll shut the chickens up for Emma recht quick.”
Quietly, Daniel reached over and slipped his hand in Hal’s. He looked troubled. “Daniel, is something bothering you?”
The boy’s dark eyes moistened. “I am worried that you are very upset with me for ruining your wedding.” His voice trembled.
Hal put her arm around him and hugged him close. “You should know, Daniel Lapp, that I’d never be really upset at you no matter what you did. You must understand that I love you that much and a whole bunch more.” She kissed his cheek.
“Des verschtehn ich, but Papa says I need to tell you how sorry I am for what I did,” he said in a small voice. “To say so is part of my penance.”
“Are you really sorry?”
“Jah, so really sorry,” Daniel vowed, nodding his head.
“Well then, it is good that you’ve done what your father asked.” Hal cupped his chin in her hand. “Listen to me. You really didn’t ruin my wedding.”
Daniel perked up, but he looked confused. “I didn’t?”
“Between you, me and the fence post, that is probably the only wedding around here in years that almost everyone had a good time at during such a long ceremony. Folks will remember for years the day they were at the Lapp wedding when Daniel turned the frog loose. Probably the only wedding they didn’t doze off at.”
Daniel gave her a relieved smile as he explained, “I didn’t really turn Goliath loose. He just escaped on his own.”
“I believe you, but that doesn’t mean you’re off the hook with everyone else. It just means I am not upset. I don’t want to hear any more about your ruining my wedding. The wedding was a beautiful ceremony I’ll treasure forever, because it joined me to you and the others in this family. That’s how I choose to remember my wedding day,” Hal said, patting Daniel on the back. “I’ll make sure to tell your father that you have apologized to me as he asked you to. Now I’ve got to go back down the lane before it rains. I just remembered I left my new shoes against a fence post.”
“I’ll get them for you,” Daniel said, sprinting away.
The others came to meet Daniel as they walked to the house in the dusky dark, watching forked lightning streak the gloomy sky. Thunder boomed every few minutes, increasingly louder as the storm grew closer. Just moments after they made it inside, a flash of lightning lit up the living room. John lit the oil lamp by his rocker. Strong thunder rumbled long and loud, rattling the window panes. A downpour of large drops pounded the porch boards as the rain moistened the dust. Everyone was content to settle down and too tired to talk. They listened, only half awake, as rain drops pattered against the windows.
In a few days, daily farm life set in with a passion for the Lapp family. John took to spending long hours in the field. The corn was ready to chop for silage to fill the silo. This was the winter feed for the milk cows. From the kitchen, Hal and Nora heard the corn binder coming closer to the fence in the back yard.
“Let’s go see what’s happening out there. I’ve never seen a corn binder at work,” Hal told her mother.
“Me either,” Nora said.
They walked behind the hen house, and Emma came from feeding the chickens to join them. Hal shaded her eyes from the bright sun beating down on them so she could see better. The horse drawn corn binder chopped its way across the field, making snapping sounds as the binder swallowed up the stalks. The gasoline powered engine chugged noisily. John sat on the metal seat and guided the work horses along side the two corn rows he wanted to chop.
The corn binder, with sickles in the front that clattered back and forth, sliced the rows of semi green stalks low to the ground. The stalks laid over onto the gathering chains that sent the plants up the chute to be bundled. A knotter mechanism tied the bundle, making a snapping bang as it cut the binder twine. The bundle went on its way over the edge of the chute.
John had hired Levi and Josh to help him with the field work. Jim insisted on going along to help, stating that this reminded him of harvest when he was a kid. Levi managed the team that kept the flat bed wagon close along side the corn binder. Josh and Jim stood on the edge of the wagon at the back of the binder. It was their job to catch and pull the bundles onto the flatbed wagon and pile them along the wagon bed.
Jim looked across the fence and gave a big wave to the women. Nora clucked her tongue. “Will you look at that old fool? You’d think he was still on the Titonka FFA float in the fourth of July parade in Algona.”
“Mom, he’s having fun,” Hal defended.
“I see that. I just hope he’s being careful,” insisted Nora.
“I didn’t know Dad got to ride in the parade,” Hal said, watching the binder make the bend and move away from them.
“It was no big deal. The FFA students had him hold onto a small pig for them. He held it by one leg and waved with the other hand the whole parade. I couldn’t hardly stand the smell of him the rest of the day. Don’t see how anyone else could keep from noticing.”
When the binder got part way back down the field, the wagon was full. Levi yelled to John to stop. The men rode the loaded wagon to the silo behind the barn. John hooked the conveyor belt beneath the silo to the PTO on the steel wheeled tractor. He stepped upon the tractor and started it. The conveyor belt moved smoothly to the chopper, and the big fan rumbled.
Daniel and Noah unhitched the team, led them out of the way and tied them to the fence. The loud noises and everyone moving fast made the horses nervous. Even from a distance, they stamped and shuffled their feet as if protesting the mechanical progress that threatened to replace them.
Hal came from the house, eager to get in on the work. She helped Josh and Emma slide the bundles over the edge of the wagon. Noah and Jim placed them on the conveyor belt. John’s job was to cut the binder twine and pull it away from the bundle so the stalks could be scattered along the belt. If the stalks had been allowed to bunch up that would plug the chopper and stop it. The stalks rustled and groaned to the other end of the belt and rattled loudly as the shredder chewed them up. The blower roared as the corn pieces disappeared into the silo.
In the gusty, hot wind, small pieces of shaft from the dry corn leaves flew in swirls around the workers, plastering to their sweaty skin with an itchy sting. The air smelled of crushed foliage and moist corn bits, a damp, sweet smell.
Emma tugged on a bundle that caught under the end of another bundle. She was leaning backward with the effort as she tugged. If the bundle came free too suddenly she might have lost her balance and fell off the wagon. Seeing Emma had a problem, Josh, in two steps, was by her side, with his hands over hers, pulling the bundle free with her. She smiled at him and mouthed the word, “denki.” He gave her a dazzling grin as he kept his hands on hers for a long moment before he took the bundle from her. Emma turned back and reached for another bundle. With all the deafening noise around them, words were almost impossible to hear without shouting.
Josh kept smiling to no one in particular as he swaggered over to the edge of the wagon to give the bundle to Levi. Hal saw the exchange between Josh and Emma. That boy meant to leave a lasting impression on the girl, and it was one Hal didn’t like. What worried her was, she wasn’t Emma. It was more important what she thought about that young man. Did the young woman see through this stranger who Hal thought was as cocky as one of Emma’s roosters?
The flat bed wagon was about empty. Hal sat down on the end of the wagon and hopped to the ground. She should get the men a glass of tea before they went back to the field. It wouldn’t hurt to see how Mom was doing in the kitchen, either. She wasn’t exactly used to the wood cookstove or where to find anything she might need.
This was just the beginning of fall harvest. As soon as their silo was filled, John would take the corn binder to another neighbor. He told Hal he’d help other farmers fill their silo. Later in the season, he’d help pick corn by hand. The farmers would stack the corn stalks in shocks in the field to dry for winter feed for stock cows. After the ears dried, they would husk the corn with a hook attached to a leather strap buckled around their hand to pulled the ears off. They threw the corn into a horse pulled wagon that had a back board attached so the corn would bounce off and fall into the wagon. As soon as the wagon was full, the men scooped the corn into a crib to store. Just hearing about all that work meant Hal wouldn’t be seeing much of her husband until the harvest was over. The only way the farmers ever finished before the snows came was by helping each other.