We crest another hill. The five passengers inside the Hyundai, myself included, are silent, our eyes frantically scanning the hills. Suddenly, we see dark movement through the trees. Then, again. Our eyes strain. We crest one last hill and, behold, Amish Country.
Berlin (pronounced BER-lin), Ohio. As we pull into town, we eagerly point out the Amish to each other. We watch these mysterious folks riding bicycles, digging in gardens and walking on the roadside.
We have come for their handiwork. Years ago, when my father moved into an apartment at college, he found that the previous renters had left a kitchen table. This table has endured three years of college use and 31 years of marriage, the last 22 of which involved children. This table now needs new legs, which is where the Amish enter.
We carry the tabletop, freshly sanded and smooth, into a warehouse-like building. While my family lingers at the door, waiting for the lights to be turned on, our Amish guides walk casually into the darkness. We wait for a moment longer before following hesitantly.
In the center of the room I can barely make out an Amish man reaching upward. A flare of light explodes suddenly from the single oil lamp in the building and settles to illuminate approximately four square feet with a dull yellow glow. As the seven of us — my family and our two stalwart Amish guides — huddle in the precious light, I wonder why they made the building so large if they planned to only use one lamp, and why the blueprints did not include windows.
We explore the surrounding area while waiting for our table. Our first stop is a cheese store in nearby Millersburg, for we know the Amish are cheese-making fiends. Heini, while an unfortunate surname for most individuals, is the perfect name for a cheese distributor. Heini’s Cheese has wheels upon wheels of cheeses of all flavors: horseradish, moon (yes, moon), jalapeno.
Most importantly, Heini’s has free samples. We peruse these samples shamelessly, ensuring that our digestion will be abnormal for weeks. Joyful music plays inside my head as I savor the flavor of old milk.
Lunch is at a family-owned restaurant most likely called Kaufman’s or Yoder’s — these more or less being the only two names I hear while in Berlin. I am convinced that the Kaufmans (alternately, Kauffman, Kaufmann, Kauffmann, Coffman or Cauffman) are engaged in a war reminiscent of the Corleones and the Tattaglias, or of the Montagues and Capulets.
Halfway through the meal, there is a commotion outside. I peer through the window (there are windows in Kaufman’s or Kaufmann’s or Kauffmann’s or Yoder’s) as I chomp on sweet potato fries and see a solemn convoy of buggies driving past.
A woman at the table next to us remarks that it must be a wedding procession. We wander outside, and I wonder how the woman could tell these special black wedding hats, coats, slacks and dresses from the Amish’s everyday black hats, coats, slacks and dresses. I make a mental note that I must get my glasses checked, after I get glasses.
Upon returning to the warehouse of darkness, we find that the Amish have attached the wrong legs to our table, so we look forward to eating off of a folding card table for the next two weeks, until we can retrieve our table. As we leave Berlin, my mother insists that my father stop the car so that she can take a picture of the sheaves of wheat in the field the road runs beside. He glances in his rearview mirror to ensure that no buggies are approaching beside us on the berm. It’s clear, and he obliges.
As my mother attempts to capture the quaint beauty of dead plants we see, in the mirror, a black speck appear on the horizon. The black speck is soon revealed to be a black buggy carrying a man with a black hat, black jacket, black slacks and brown beard.
My mother gets her photograph and hurries back to the car. As we pull out of Berlin, enjoying the sweet convenience of a gasoline engine, I recall how pleasant it was to go a day without sirens and streetlights, without noise and food preservatives. I would leave it at a day, though. There is something condescending about Amish simplicity, like their aversion to modern technology has somehow made them more judgmental than us electrified individuals. Perhaps my abuse of modern ease has forced me to accept my acute moral depravity. Perhaps their refusal of such ease has made them blind to their own human shortcomings. Regardless, the Hyundai’s air-conditioning feels fine on my face, which is reason enough for me to stay plugged-in.
Turn out the lights with Christopher at cjs109@pitt.edu.
Experiencing Amish life, but only for a day
Published: Friday, November 14, 2008
Updated: Thursday, November 13, 2008
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