by Jerry
This evening the young folks had a softball game at the schoolhouse. That’s not my favorite sport, but I heard they might also play volleyball afterward, so hope lay on the horizon. The softball game started at 6:30, with the meal served at 6:00. Since I didn’t have anything to do at Lonnie and Luella’s, I walked down at 5:30, arriving before anyone else.
The softball game went until dark, and then the volleyball net came out. They played by the light of the electric yard light. It sure beats lanterns on the buggies for light, but there wasn’t quite the same feel of home. That may have been a good thing for me right now. I don’t need a lot of reminders of what I’m missing. We played two games. The first round our side got skunked, and the next game we beat them twenty-one to five, so it was their turn to get skunked.
None of the men wear beards. I did see a mustache, which was a little strange. But then I don’t know that much about Mennonites. The girls are dressed differently, both in dress design and color.
Afterward, I walked home in the moonlight—the moon was almost full. That brought back a lot of memories, and I longed to have you with me. But wishing does no good for a parting that cannot be changed.
I still haven’t received a letter from you, but perhaps you’ve written one and it’s on its way here. I hope so.
With all my love,
Eugene
Thursday evening, September 2
Dear Eugene,
Hi! I am home from babysitting and still shaky from running around the house trying to get all the work done before the regular chores. We had another cow go dry this week, and I don’t think Dad plans to replace her. I believe he may be thinking of eventually giving up milking altogether, with the prices the way they are. But with Don getting older, he probably won’t. Boys need things to do, and there aren’t many factory jobs around here.
Mom, of course, teased me when I arrived home. “Are you bored? Because if you are, we have something for you. A treasure hunt. Rosanna and Betsy have been working hard hiding your ‘treasure.’”
The little teases. I knew it was a letter from you and let out a shriek. Mom and brother Larry, who happened to be around at the time, got a good laugh out of that. I raced around following the clues. When I finally found it (in the bread box), I took it outside and sat by the hay wagon to read it at once.
It was so good to hear from you!
I’ve had a lonesome time from Sunday evening till now. I kept hoping to somehow hear from you—as if that were possible before you wrote. I’ve been waiting anxiously, figuring you hadn’t had time yet. Still, when there was no letter yesterday, I went up to my room and cried. Big cry baby, I know, but you have my heart. Don’t ever forget that.
This morning I got really sensible and figured the letter surely would arrive today. And it did! You can’t imagine how much happier I’ll be tonight now that I’ve heard from you.
Each night when I go to bed, I lie there wondering how you’re doing, what you’re feeling, and if you’re as lonesome as I am. Last night I wondered about the home you’re in, but after reading your letter, I now know the answers to that.
I want to know everything, Eugene. How the people are, what the scenery is like, what the schoolhouse is like, and about your pupils once you start teaching. But most of all about you.
I’m joining the other young folks tonight in cleaning the schoolhouse. This will be my first time attending the young folks’ gatherings without you since we have been going steady. I’m not at all sure I would go except that I’ll probably be more lonely just staying home.
I’m sure I wouldn’t go if it weren’t for your letter. It cheered me up, and I feel like I have energy again. But I should go now. Dad will have the buggy hitched for me, and I don’t like being late. I will write more later.
After 11:00…
Here I am, back from the youth gathering. I felt like crying all evening, often catching myself glancing around, thinking I heard your voice rumbling amongst the boys’ but knowing in the back of my mind it couldn’t be. Would you please hurry back? It was hard to see other couples talking together as we all cleaned the schoolhouse since I know what I’m missing.
Tomorrow night the young folks are supposed to husk corn if it doesn’t rain. I don’t know if I’ll go or not. Anna Hochstetler told Mom I’m not supposed to quit attending the young folks’ gatherings because they need me. It made me feel better, but I don’t understand how they need me. I mostly go to keep occupied so I won’t get quite so lonely.
I’d like to write something cheerful and make you happy, but I don’t quite know what it could be. Maybe we can think on the future when we can be together again. When I think of that time, it seems a long way off so I get quite impatient. As you know, I’m not especially blessed with patience—not in some things anyway. Sometimes I imagine how it will be in our future. How wonderful when that day will finally arrive.
Usually when I’m looking forward to something, I have this awful fear of being disappointed. Sometimes I have been, and other times I’m nicely surprised. But since my future involves you, I don’t know how I can ever be disappointed.
Wednesday…
I brought home two books of poetry from the lady I work for. They contained all different kinds of poems, with one that really expressed the feelings I have about us. Well, it would be even better if you were here, but this is the best I can do for now. So here it is…
From My Heart…
May our friendship uplift us and draw us together,
May it continue transparent though trials we weather.
May our love be as strong and as pure as the snow,
May it grow in the sun and deepen in woe.
May our joy in each other never dim or decrease,
May it climb into ecstasy and decline into peace.
May our hope be as bright as the sun in its shine,
May the shadows remind us of the light that’s behind.
May our love ever deepen and sweet’n the way,
May it ever grow dearer with more wonder each day.
—T.T. WELLS
Well, it is past 11:00, and I should get some sleep. The rest of the children are in bed. Mom and Dad spent the evening at the Burkholders, and I can just now hear the buggy drive in. They must have had a good time to have stayed so late.
I’m thinking I’d better finish this letter tonight as I go to work tomorrow and I might not have time.
Write me everything, please. It all interests me. I even wonder how everyone looks, not that I expect you to describe everyone, but try.
With all my love,
Naomi
P.S. Eugene, would you cut this stamp off the envelope and send it back for Betsy? She is collecting stamps, and she doesn’t have this one. Thanks.
Thursday evening, September 2
My dearest Naomi,
“In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world” ( John 16:33).
Whee…and so ends my first day of school, which went fairly well, all things considered. Those first graders are something else. You have to keep them occupied every minute or they start squirming in their seats.
I purposely didn’t plan too heavy a schedule for the first day, as the year I taught in the Amish school I’d started in too fast. But today I ran out of things to do before the day was over. The school here has an extra hour of schooltime, for which I will need to make adjustments.
Everything is strange and different, and the adaptations keep hitting me in the face. First there was meeting Lonnie and Luella that first night, followed by seeing the countryside when it got daylight, visiting the schoolhouse, getting to know the young folks, and now watching all the children sitting there looking at me expectantly. It did bring back a lot of memories from my previous year of teaching though.
Here are the big events of my first day…
I called two girls down for whispering, and saw at once that their faces looked funny. I asked them, “Were yo
u whispering?”
They said, “No.”
So I said, “Okay, then.” Didn’t know what else to do with them. They looked so innocent…and yet I know they were whispering.
One of the first graders stuck up his hand and asked me something I couldn’t understand. I had him repeat it three times and still couldn’t understand him, so I simply said, “Okay.”
He then got up and shoved his desk over beside his sister’s desk. So that was what he was asking.
A first grader said he had to blow his nose and didn’t have a handkerchief. I gave him mine.
Well, they are a lively bunch and pretty well behaved, so I shouldn’t have any problems in that area. Wish me well and the best of success. I think I need it.
My love is always yours,
Eugene
Friday evening, September 3
Hello, dearest Eugene,
Greetings in our Savior and Comforter’s dear name.
We had a great time at the youth cornhusking last night. I actually broke through my loneliness for you and enjoyed myself. Don just turned sixteen yesterday, so he got to go along. It helps having company on the long drives to and from the gatherings, even if it’s my brother.
Don is helping Dad with the hay making today. I suppose Mom and I have to go out after chores and help them unload a wagon or two. When I got home from babysitting, I noticed they were letting things stack up. I’m still very tired from last night, but so it goes. Before long I’ll be like an old mare with a limp and a bent back.
I squealed tonight again at the sight of your welcomed letter. I sat down and read it right away. I’m so glad to hear you’re well occupied with school. I can imagine it helps pass the time better. I thought, “Oh, if only I could be there to help you.” But that, of course, isn’t possible.
How is the weather? Ours has been kind of cool the last couple of days, but it was warmer this morning for a change.
Your sister Mary told me tonight that one of your chinchillas had more babies. I want to look at them Sunday, a day I’m afraid is going to be pretty hard without you. Especially since church is right there at your place.
Mary also told me that some of them want to go out to see you sometime soon. She said I could go along. I can hardly wait.
You are in my thoughts,
Your Naomi
Saturday evening, September 4
My dearest Naomi,
Christian greetings of love.
I hope it doesn’t bother you that I write so often, but I have to do something to relieve my homesickness. Maybe later on I will get used to things around here and won’t have to write to you constantly.
I received a letter from my folks Friday evening, which helped some, giving me a few minutes of profitable time reading the letter in the living room. Luella glanced in while I was reading, so I gave it to her afterward. Don’t worry, I don’t give her your letters. Lonnie and Luella are very interested in any news from our community and act like they want to make friends with our folks if they get the chance. They have a soft spot in their hearts for Amish people.
All of which doesn’t help me much at the moment, as I sit around in my loneliness. Every once in a while I think it’s gone, but then it’s back again. Especially when I sit here remembering it’s Saturday evening, and I can’t look forward to seeing you tomorrow. Sort of breaks my heart.
This loneliness makes me wonder why I ever came out here in the first place, which doesn’t help either. I hope you know how much I miss you and how much it hurts. I try to keep my mind off of home as much as I can, but it doesn’t always work. Especially like this evening, when I have too much time to think, so the memories of our good times together come rushing in.
I sit back on the couch here and remember your cozy room upstairs, your living room with the old woodstove, the hand-written Scriptures on the wall, the couch where we sat and talked, and talked, and talked.
There seems to be so much security one draws from familiar places, and yet here they are all gone, as are you. Well, you aren’t really gone. I guess it just feels so.
Memories, memories, and more memories.
Sunday afternoon…
I missed you at church this morning. The service was nothing like the Amish church service at home. There was not a buggy in sight, just cars and more cars filling the parking lot. They have a large congregation here, which is surprising. As far apart as the places are, and as open as the fields are, there doesn’t seem to be that many people around, let alone Mennonites.
The church house is huge, but the minister wasn’t as interesting as some of our Amish ministers are, but maybe I’m just not used to them yet. I did miss our slow German singing. English singing on Sunday morning is something I will have to get used to. There’s no one around here who even knows the German language, let alone our German tunes.
Lonnie and Luella told me the sad tale of their daughter last night. What provoked the story was my mentioning how lonesome I am, so I guess Luella thought I should know that other people also have problems.
Their only daughter ran away with an Englisha man when she was only nineteen. Luella said a bunch of younger local Mennonite boys had been interested in her, and one even drove down from Michigan, but the daughter kept turning everyone down. For the longest time they couldn’t figure out why, until she told them she was interested in the Englisha neighbor boy, whose sister she was good friends with.
So for the next year or so, with much ruckus involved, they tried to keep her away from the neighbor boy, but she would sneak out anyway. When they put the daughter under further restrictions, the boy set a ladder up against the side of the house, under the daughter’s upstairs bedroom window. I guess he was going to have her climb down. They caught him in the act and ordered him off the place, but it didn’t do any good. They finally gave up, and the daughter ran off, marrying the boy in a quick ceremony in front of a judge.
It’s hard to imagine all of this happening so many years ago in this house, and some of it in the room next to mine. I haven’t dared look in, as the door is shut all the time. It would have to give one chills to stand at the very window where an Englisha boy had his ladder extended, trying to extract a young nineteen-year-old girl from her parents’ home.
Yesterday, we drove down to the Amish auction at Fairfield. There is a large Amish settlement there, but I doubt if I will have much contact with them because of the distance involved. The auction had a lot of nice things to sell, but everything was going sky-high in my opinion. Probably because nobody seemed to care how much they paid for the items. All of the proceeds go to the Mennonite Central Committee, which is the Mennonite’s mission arm. One of the quilts sold for over 800 dollars.
I had a surprise when we arrived in Fairfield. Lonnie and Luella had been talking on the way down about their good friends who lived there, a couple by the name of Ben and Mary Miller, and how they wanted us to meet them while in town. When we arrived, they introduced me. We soon figured out that Ben is a cousin to my grandmother on my father’s side. After that juicy bit of knowledge, they really started talking.
In local news, I kept hearing about Stan Miller. He is the youth leader here, and a good one they say. He’s married and leads the youth group when they have Bible study every week. From what Lonnie and Luella say, some of the people in church aren’t too pleased with what he teaches, including themselves. But I was still looking forward to meeting the man. And this morning I was introduced to him. He’s extremely self-confident but soft spoken. I think I will like him.
Well, I’d better eat supper so I can be at the singing on time. It starts at six o’clock. Everyone was glad to hear that I enjoy singing, and they’re expecting to really have a good singing tonight. I’m afraid they might be expecting too much out of me. As you know, my voice isn’t the greatest.
Monday evening…
We aren’t having school today because of Labor Day, so this morning I painted garage doors for Lonnie. They had company in
for dinner—some older people who talked about their bygone days. I didn’t know any of them, but it was kind of interesting.
The singing was lousy on Sunday evening, and I’m not sure why, as they sing many of the same English songs we do after our German singing on Sunday nights. Maybe our Amish young people come from good singing families, I don’t know, but I don’t blame them for only having one singing a month. Things went a little better halfway through when a couple of the young people sang three songs by themselves. That must be where the good singers were hiding.
There was a young folks hot dog roast planned for this evening, since it’s Labor Day, but we got rain most of the day so they called it off. Instead, they had a gathering in one of the homes, where we played board games till nine o’clock. One of the young boys picked me up and dropped me off afterward. It’s nasty not having your own transportation, even if it’s only a buggy and a horse.
One of the girls tonight said that the next time I write to you, I am supposed to tell you “Hi” for them. They said they’re all excited to meet you. I’d told them my family and you have a trip planned out here.
Keep me informed on all the news at home—the weddings and such. And if you get tired of so many letters, you’ll just have to say so.
So long,
Eugene
September 5
My dearest Eugene,
Good morning! You are probably still in dreamland as it’s 3:30 in the morning here. I’m brightly awake, wrapped in a blanket, and sitting in front of my dresser. Before I lit the kerosene lamp, I looked outside. It’s bright moonlight again. It reminded me of what you had written in your letter about bringing back memories—precious ones.
I went to bed at 10:30 last night, but I had slept most of the day yesterday, so maybe I’m finally slept out. I had stayed indoors all day with some kind of flu. It must have been a one-day affair because a good day’s rest seems to have knocked it out. I got up Saturday morning sniffling and blowing my nose, but with the sleep I’ve been getting things became progressively better as the day went along. Now at 3:30 a.m. it’s nothing but an irritation. I think I should be able to go to church without any problem.