by Sarah Price
“It’s me, Jake!” Jake emerged from behind the mules, his straw hat tilted backwards on his head. He was smiling, his teeth white and his face jovial as he said, “You better be watching where you’re mowing, Daniel. Your rows are a bit crooked, eh?”
Daniel looked behind the mower and saw that the rows were, indeed, crooked, evidence that he had been paying attention to something other than the hay cutting. “Reckon you are right,” he said sheepishly.
Jake rested his hand on the back of the mule and, with his other hand, took off the hat and fanned his face. “If I was a betting man, I’d gamble on the fact that there are plenty of fields with crooked plowing in the spring, eh?” He laughed as he looked around the farm, admiring the waving rows of hay. “Sure is pretty up here,” he said.
“Ja,” Daniel replied, his eyes glancing toward the farmhouse one more time. “Spring is a pretty follow-up to winter anyway.”
“You seem awfully handy with this mower,” Jake said. “Mayhaps not so good with driving straight but, if you might be willing to help me, I could forgive that quick enough. Never cared for straight lines anyway,” he teased.
“Help you?”
Jake plopped his hat back on his head, the three-inch brim shading his eyes from the sun. “Well,” he started, “I sure could use some help cutting my hay. Now I know your daed is going to need help but, from the looks of things, I probably planted mine just a touch too early and it’s ready now. Sure was hoping that you might have some spare time to help me out.”
The unspoken part of the request was that Jake was new to farming and didn’t always know the when, how, and why of crops. Daniel tried not to smile, knowing that this would bring a good round of laughter at the dinner table. “Well, I’ll speak with Daed but I’m sure he wouldn’t mind none if I helped you.”
“Seeing that we’re brothers, eh?” Jake added with a wink.
Daniel laughed. “Ja, seeing that we’re brothers.”
Jake gave the mule an affectionate slap on the rump. “Gut! That’s settled then.” He glanced down at the farmhouse. “Reckon I’ll just wander down this here pasture and poke my head into your mamm’s kitchen. See if I can rile her up some and get sent home with one of those delicious pies that I bet she has hidden in the pantry.”
It was no secret that Katie hadn’t always been a big fan of Jake. Her lack of enthusiasm over his marriage to Sylvia had only started to change course, now that he was taking the baptism in the fall. In fact, during the summer months, he’d begin taking baptismal instructions every church Sunday with Sylvia in preparation for the baptism. Despite this, Jake had a way of flustering Katie and it had become a little bit of a game between them, but a game that was strengthening their relationship.
“Just be careful that Jacob doesn’t spy you or you’ll be going home with a little boy, too!” Daniel teased.
“Funny, that one,” Jake chuckled as he began to walk away. “Could have myself a dozen of him!”
“Dozen Jacobs? You are ferhoodled!” Daniel laughed.
“Ja, ferhoodled indeed,” Jake said over his shoulder. “Just you wait and see, Daniel. You keep staring at that pretty gal hanging laundry on the line while mowing wobbly rows in the fields…people will say you’re ferhoodled, too!” He didn’t wait to see the color rush to Daniel’s cheeks but turned back and continued on his way to his in-laws house, leaving a stunned Daniel staring after him.
By late morning, Daniel had finished mowing the hay and hurried to unharness the mules before dinner. Having arisen at four in the morning for chores, he was both tired and hungry. He knew better than to hope for an afternoon nap. He had plenty of hay to rake up and bundle. If he was lucky, he might be able to cajole David and Samuel into helping. But he certainly knew that he’d be retiring early this evening. Every muscle in his body ached from the morning’s labor.
He was headed to the house when he saw her, sweeping the porch of the grossdaadihaus. Her back was toward him so she didn’t see him approach. He took advantage of the moment to watch her. From the back, she could have been any Amish girl, except for the way she wore her prayer kapp with the strings tied at the ends and hanging down her back, not over her shoulders like most Amish girls from Lancaster County. He liked that, appreciating the practicality of not having the strings in the way during her chores. He also noticed that she was smaller framed than a lot of the Amish girls he knew. He might even dare to think of her as petite.
“Daniel!” she said, startled when she turned around and saw him watching her. “You scared me!”
“Didn’t mean to,” he replied quietly.
She smiled. “You sure are working hard in those fields today, ja?”
He took a step toward her. “You, too, hanging up all that laundry.” He paused, glanced over his shoulder at the clothes that were still dangling from the clothing line. “You sure have an interesting way to hang the clothes. It’s like a rainbow.”
She laughed. “You noticed that? My mamm always said to make even the most mundane jobs interesting by playing games. That’s my game, trying to make the clothes look pretty on the line.”
He raised an eyebrow and nodded. “That they do.”
A silence fell between them, Rachel leaning against the broom from where she stood on the porch and Daniel standing beneath her on the grass. They seemed to be assessing each other and neither one knew what to say next. One of the cows bellowed softly from the field and Daniel glanced over his shoulder, thankful for the interruption to the awkwardness.
“You headed to your mamm’s for dinner, then?” she said, breaking the silence.
“Ja, dinner.”
Rachel glanced over her shoulder at the door to Lillian’s house. “Guess I should go help inside,” she said slowly.
As she started to turn, Daniel cleared his throat as though he wanted to say something to her, to keep talking to her. But it was obvious that he didn’t know how. “Uh Rachel…” he started.
She stopped, her hand on the screen door handle. There was the briefest of hesitations before she looked over her shoulder at him, lifting her eyes from her bowed head as she met his gaze. For a moment, Daniel had to catch his breath. A wavy strand of brown hair escaped from her kapp and brushed against her cheek in the late spring breeze. With her eyes staring at him, she looked so innocent and beautiful. It struck him like a bolt of lightning that, indeed, there was a side to this young woman that he not only did not know but he longed to discover.
She waited patiently and, when he didn’t say anything, she frowned. “What is it, Daniel?”
“I…” He glanced over at the barn, nervous that his younger brothers would emerge as they headed to the house for dinner. If they saw him talking to Rachel, he knew that they would tease him mercilessly, especially Samuel. “It’s nothing,” he finally mumbled, embarrassed for having said anything at all.
“I wonder that,” she said softly, a puzzled look on her face as she began to walk through the door.
When he realized that he was losing the opportunity, he called out, “Wait!” She seemed to be as surprised as he was when she stopped and turned around, staring at him with a questioning look on her face. “I was wondering,” he found the strength to say. He felt even more foolish than before but knew that if he didn’t say it now, he probably never would. “Ja, I was wondering if…well…I might take a walk after supper. Thought you might want to stretch your legs.” She frowned and looked at him. “With me. Walking. Ja?”
A small smile graced her lips and she nodded her head once before opening the door and disappearing inside. He stood on the grass by the porch, staring at the empty space and wondering why he had acted so ferhoodled. It wasn’t like him to act so foolish and he reprimanded himself. Yet, his palms were sweaty and his heart raced inside his chest. He took a deep breath, trying to clear his head and calm down, before turning away from the porch and heading toward his parents’ next door.
It was after the dishes were washed and put away that Rachel found herself linge
ring by the door, waiting for the knock that she knew would come at some point. The sun was setting in the sky, casting a glorious array of oranges and reds and blues and purples from the horizon. She shut her eyes for a moment and thought about what Daniel had said to her the other day. Faith. She needed to have faith in him. He would show up, she told herself.
“You waiting for someone,” he said softly behind her.
Rachel spun around and dropped the towel she had been holding in her hand. “Oh!” He had walked through the house instead of walking around to the door. “You scared me, Daniel.”
He leaned down and picked up the towel. “You must’ve been deep in thought, then.” He set the towel on the counter and glanced around the room. It was empty and he took advantage of the solitude to motion toward the door. “Let’s go for that walk before we have eyes watching us, ja?”
The air was cool as they walked down the dirt lane that cut through the property toward the carpentry shop. Cicadas chirped from the fields and a few bats darted overhead. They walked in silence, neither one quite sure what to talk about with the other. Yet the silence wasn’t uncomfortable.
“Sure do love this time of year,” he started, trying to find a way to break the ice.
Rachel smiled but didn’t say anything. She felt awkward walking with Daniel but in a good way. She had never been asked to go anywhere with a young man. It was a good feeling, especially because it was Daniel. Kind, gentle Daniel who had been very kind to her, despite her not always being appreciative. She didn’t know how to make that up to him.
“Gonna be helping Jake with his hay cutting this week,” he finally said.
“Oh?”
He nodded. “Jake’s never done many of these things. Needs help and guidance, I reckon. Plus, it’s always good fellowship over there.”
“Sure had a nice time on Sunday with them,” Rachel heard herself saying. But she was thinking about the walk over with Daniel, when he had honored her request to walk through the field so that she wouldn’t be so frightened on the road. She was thinking about their conversation and how he had told her to have faith in people as well as God. She was thinking about Daniel, the handsome young man that had asked her to go walking this very evening.
“Always a wunderbaar gut time at Jake and Sylvia’s,” he said. “And gut food!”
She laughed. “Gut food makes any man happy!”
Daniel laughed with her. “Hard work and gut food go hand in hand, ja?”
They continued walking down the dirt lane toward the carpentry shop. She was thankful that Daniel had selected this road, one that didn’t have cars or even buggies on it, especially after the supper hour. When they reached the end of the road, they turned around and slowly headed back. He tried to make some small talk, pointing out the different fields along the way and telling her what they would be planting or what had already been planted.
She listened to him talk, enjoying the soothing sound of Daniel’s deep voice. His passion for farming was apparent and she found herself drawn into his world of plowing and planting and harvesting. Her own father had a smaller farm in Ohio but nothing of the size and magnitude of the Lapp farm. Only one of her brothers resided on the farm now. The rest had moved away and were working in various occupations: one worked at a tack store, two others in construction of Amish furniture. It was hard to be a farmer anymore. Land didn’t come cheap or easily.
“Ach vell,” he said as they approached the house. He had his hands thrust into his pockets. “Reckon I should go check on the dairy before retiring.”
She nodded her head but didn’t make a move to leave. She didn’t know what to say to him, to thank him for the visit, no matter how short it was. She wished she felt comfortable offering to go with him into the dairy but she was afraid that would be too forward. And she certainly didn’t want to run into his younger brother.
“Mayhaps, Rachel, we could go walking again one night, ja?”
Rachel lifted her eyes to look at him. He was staring at her with his bright, blue eyes and she felt her heart flutter inside of her chest. “Oh,” she whispered. “That would be nice but you’ll be tired this week from cutting Jake’s hay.”
He smiled at her, reaching out to gently touch her arm. “Mayhaps not,” he said softly. He took a step backwards, still watching her as she hurried up the stairs to the porch of Junior and Lillian’s house. “You have a gut week, Rachel.”
She glanced over her shoulder, watching as he walked toward the barn. He seemed to have a new spring in his step and she wondered why he had come calling this evening. But she didn’t care. She was happy to have his attention and felt certain that she could find it in her heart to put more faith in people, especially Daniel.
Chapter Eight
The next week seemed to pass in the blink of an eye. Daniel spent most of his time in the fields, helping Jake with cutting the hay. He left his parents’ house before breakfast and often returned late in the afternoon. The work was monotonous and hard, especially as the midday sun was beginning to grow hot. But Daniel loved working in the fields. There was beauty in working the land, land that God provided to man for growing food to feed their families. There was a special respect among farmers for the power of the sun, the need of the rain, and joy of working in the fields.
Daniel knew that June was a busy time of year. After helping Jake, he’d return to his own family’s farm to help with the hay cutting. The days started early and ended late. Yet, despite the work, it was also a wonderful month. The longer days and cool nights made for good work weather. Daniel didn’t mind working so hard during the day, it helped him to clear his head and to think. He thought about life and God and his own plans for the future.
In the past, he hadn’t thought too much about the future beyond being Amish. He had never doubted that for a second. He also knew that he would most likely never leave the very farm where he had been born and raised. Since his brothers Emanuel and Steve were settled down on their own farms and Junior seemed happiest working in his carpentry shop, Daniel knew that he and David would most likely share Daed’s land, especially since Samuel made it very clear that he intended to follow Junior with carpentry when he was no longer needed in the fields.
Daniel had always known that he was destined to be a farmer. He dreamed of having his own farm with his own crops and cattle. The more he worked, the more he dreamed. He wanted to live off the land and raise a family that benefited from honest labor and heartfelt love. Living off of his family’s land was fine, too. But eventually, he would have to settle down and start his own family.
Family, he thought, as he sat on the porch of Sylvia and Jake’s house. He had been working in the fields all day, thankful for a late afternoon iced tea before he began heading home to help Daed and Junior with the evening milking. He could hear Sylvia inside the house, tending to their baby, just six weeks old, if that. The baby was fussing and, he imagined, Sylvia was trying to settle him down with a feeding before she prepared the evening meal for Jake. It had amazed him how naturally Sylvia had taken to being a mother. She juggled the baby with her responsibilities around the house as if it was the most natural thing in the world.
Even Jake, who had his own bad spells during their short marriage, seemed more relaxed and at ease. Daniel loved to watch his brother-in-law hold that small baby in his arms. The baby looked so tiny and delicate when his father held him, especially given that Jake was so large in statue. But it was the way that Jake looked down into his face, with complete love and adoration. Daniel knew that it would happen to him one day but he was willing to wait. He felt that he was more like his brothers, Emanuel and Steve, who married later in life, waiting until their late-twenties instead of rushing into marriage like so many other Amish youths who married when they were barely twenty.
Daniel hadn’t thought much about courting or even marriage. Yet he knew that it was the natural order of things. If he wanted to keep Daed’s farm, he’d need the help of many and that started with a
good strong wife who was willing to work alongside him, both in the barn and in the fields while tending to the children.
For four years, Daniel had been attending the singings and he had offered rides home to several girls. But none of them had proven to be more than just friends to Daniel. He wasn’t interested in any of them…not like that, he thought. If he was ever going to marry, he knew it would be for someone special, someone that was as hard working as he was. And, he realized, with Steve and Sylvia gone, his family would be anxious for him to cross that line so that Daed wouldn’t be forced to hire help next season, especially if Samuel began helping Junior in the carpentry shop, something that he had hinted at on numerous occasions.
“Goedendag!”
Daniel looked up, surprised to see Rachel walking across the backfield, a basket in her hand and smile on her face. She seemed more relaxed and at ease than he had ever seen her during her weeks at the farm. “Goedendag,” he replied, watching her approach.
Her face was shining and her eyes seemed to glow. Even her greeting was full of joy, something that he hadn’t heard too much from this young woman. “Your mamm sent me over with some canned goods for Sylvia and Jake,” she explained as she walked up the porch steps. She stopped momentarily to touch the baby bud of a rose bush that Sylvia had planted near the steps. “Also with an invitation to sup after church this week.”