Amish Friends

An Amish buggy at the produce auction, Lincoln, County, KY.

Today I spoke to my Amish friend, Sam, on the telephone. It was the first time we’ve talked since the school shooting on Monday in Lancaster. I can usually catch Sam, his wife, or one of their eight children still at home on the phone (it’s in a field near their farm), early in the morning.

I have gotten to know Sam’s family this summer as I sometimes buy extra produce for the farmstand when stocks are low. Their farm, located in Lincoln County, is much larger and highly productive.

Sam and his family, including children ages six to 18 (and his wife never failed to make a crop), all work on the farm spring, summer, and fall. Three of the children are now in school part of the day. It is very much like the school in Nickel Mines, PA, a single room and a small class of children between the ages of 6 and 13 in a simple white paneled building. The family moved to Kentucky, as others in their family had done, about 10 years ago from Missouri.

Sue, Sam’s wife, and I have had similar lifestyles the last few months: Rising early to prepare our farm stands for customers, picking half runner beans until it was too dark to see them on the vines; getting behind on our canning and preserving. We both are picky about our vegetables and Sue is known for having some of the best produce in the valley. She is also slyly funny. One day I saw a handwritten sign at her stand: "Will Haul Amish" with a phone number of a local person with wheels, ready to serve as an Amish chauffeur. I laughed and asked, "Where are they going to haul them?" Sue looked up from her solar-powered calculator without missing a beat and said, "the dump!"

Sam and others in this small Amish community in Kentucky had heard of the shooting and some details. He had not heard that two additional girls had died Tuesday, nor the details of the revenge motive of the shooter. "It is incomprehensible," Sam said, and the way he said it, slowly, I could tell it was a word he probably had never found necessary to use before. He also told me that he was told by one of the Amish with relatives in Lancaster, that one or two additional girls had been taken off life support and had been brought home to die with their family, which was not in the news stories at that time.

The Amish do communicate and telephone and share news in their communities. Many prayer vigils have been held for the girls in Amish communities in places like Missouri, Kentucky, Michigan, and Canada so news did travel relatively quickly without television or the internet.

Sam said the children in their village were aware that something bad had happened, and that children had been shot. They were frightened, he said. "But children will forget." But the adults won’t, he didn’t need to add. I asked him if he thought it would change things in Lancaster, a place where they have friends, but no close relatives. He said no, they will go on as before.

The Amish never question God’s will, I remembered. It was a sentiment echoed by an Amish man I had heard on television today who had forgiven the man who killed two of his granddaughters. Then Sam  said something that surprised me, "I think we are in the last days."

I know this is something other fundamentalist christians believe but it was the first time I had heard it from an Amish person, and not sure it would be typical. It’s not something I would normally subscribe to as I am not an overly religious person, nor do I know much about the apocalypse as foretold in the bible.  But watching the news that day it crossed my mind. The events of 9/11, the war in Iraq, lawlessness even in our elected leaders… who wouldn’t think these are the last days? Lining up little Amish girls before a blackboard in a one-room schoolhouse and executing them? Incomprehensible.

People tend to romanticize the Amish and their simple life. But getting to know a couple of the families here and witnessing how lovingly they raise their children — and how dear and good those children are — you can’t help seeing them this way.  I know that the Amish have renewed my faith in humanity. While I’m amazed that the local milkman could do such evil, I am overwhelmed by the grace and kindness of an Amish family who would invite his widow to their child’s funeral.

I cringed most of Monday watching the news as ignorance of the Amish and their ways was broadcast on television. I even penned an email to CNN when the clueless anchor stated how he didn’t know how they called 911 since they don’t use phones. And I hate how insensitive reporters and photographers are who continue to invade the privacy of the Amish and use zoom lenses to photograph their grief (especially the children). The Amish are too kind to be rude so the media has managed to get a few comments, one from a man who spoke with his back to the camera. By now they should know that being photographed is against Amish religious beliefs.

But one upside is that two days later the "television people" (who I think of as more of a bizarre religious sect than the Amish) and print media seem to have done their homework, contacted Amish experts, and are trying to explain Amish traditions and beliefs to the public. I hope this new understanding will keep tourists from treating Amish people like zoo animals they can photograph at will. I truly do.