“Oh?” Although Bertha was the one with the medical background, there were times when Lydia could be quite insightful. “What do you think it is?”
“Do you remember the way I acted after my first miscarriage?”
Lydia had suffered several miscarriages during her marriage. She rarely mentioned that time in her life, although Bertha knew it had to have been devastating.
“I wasn’t living here then,” Bertha reminded her. “I was still in school.”
“That’s true,” Lydia said. “And I didn’t want to worry you, so I didn’t say anything in my letters, but I got to where I didn’t want to get out of bed. It wasn’t physical, I just felt very tired and sleepy. I’ve read since that sad people sometimes tend to sleep a lot.”
“You mean, you think Anna might be depressed?”
“Maybe. It’s just a thought.” Lydia shrugged as she went out the door. “But it’s not her nature to act like this. Anna has always loved life, but now it’s like all the joy has drained out of her.”
Lydia was right. Anna’s recent behavior was unusual for her. Of course, the cold winter days that kept them all cooped up inside the house was not helpful to anyone’s psyche. Bertha was feeling a little down herself, but now that Christmas had passed, and there was nothing new to look forward to, it was like Anna had utterly lost her sparkle.
While Lydia gathered eggs, Bertha looked up the number of Anna’s heart doctor in the telephone book, wrote the number on the back of a used envelope, then she donned her coat and boots and headed outside to the phone shanty at the end of their driveway.
It was time for her to call her niece and discuss her fears about Anna. It annoyed her when Rachel did not answer her phone. Bertha did not like leaving a message and kept it as short as possible.
“When you get a chance, I need to talk to you, Rachel. It’s not an emergency, but…” Bertha hesitated. Then she hung up. There was so much more she wanted to say, trying to leave a message felt overwhelming.
With Rachel not available, Bertha called Anna’s doctor’s office and asked for the soonest date possible. However, the secretary answering the phone gave her the disturbing information that Anna’s doctor had retired, and a new doctor was taking over his practice. This was not good news. She liked Anna’s doctor. He was in his seventies, which made it easier for her to trust him. These new doctors coming into the area just kept looking younger and younger. Bertha wasn’t at all sure that they actually knew anything. She preferred her doctors to have at least a few strands of gray hair.
Chapter 18
Massillon, Ohio
1963
Bertha Troyer sat stiffly on stage as the Dean of Nursing called the names of women awaiting graduation from the Massillon Community Hospital School of Nursing.
As she listened for her name, she scanned the crowd, hoping for a friendly face and knowing there would be none. Her cocky new nurses’ cap, tilted at just the right angle, felt odd after having worn an Amish bonnet most of her life. She had to fight the desire to adjust it.
Her starchy white nurse’s uniform felt odd, too, even though it fit her well. Maybe a little too well. Ever since she had begun wearing non-Amish clothes, she had attracted more attention than she wanted. There was something about her 5’11’ body and natural white-blonde hair that made most men look twice. She didn’t like the extra attention, but there wasn’t much she could do about it. She hadn’t been the one to choose the standard nurse’s uniform.
The white stockings and garter belt had been a trial to get used to. One of the things about her former life that she missed was not being expected to wear any stockings. The long dresses did not require such a thing.
The nursing shoes, however, were very comfortable. They were not as comfortable as going barefoot, of course, which she had done most of her life, but they were necessary.
Her graduating class of twenty young women had drawn quite a crowd. The college auditorium was full of smiling faces, but not one person from her family had shown up. She did not really expect any of them to come, but she couldn’t help hoping there would be someone in the crowd who would be proud of her and proud of what she had accomplished.
It had often struck her as ironic that she was basically considered the black sheep of the family now. Such a rebel she had been for wanting an education! Such a rebel she had been to follow her dream to become a nurse!
But it had been worth it.
If all went well, she would be stepping onto an airplane next week. Although she had not formally joined the Mennonite church, she had been in contact with Charlotte, the woman who had written the letter about the dirt cookies. Charlotte’s husband had pulled strings with some of the leaders of the Mennonite group who supported the work done in Haiti. They had paid her and two other nurses’ passage to Haiti.
The time had finally come. This was precisely what Bertha had fought for—a bigger life than what was expected of her back home. Marriage was all well and good, and she wanted all of that someday, but it was not the focus of her existence like it was with most of her childhood friends.
It wasn’t until after she and all the other graduating nurses had walked across the stage to receive their diplomas, that she saw a black bonnet bobbing about in the crowd that was milling about. Her heart nearly stopped—could it be? Had someone from her church or family come to see her? She had sent a letter to her family, inviting them to her graduation, but she knew none of them would come. Lydia and her mother would want to, but would not be brave enough to go against Daett’s wishes. Or at least that’s what she had thought.
She felt like she was swimming upstream as she made her way through the crowd with people congratulating her all along the way. Then she saw her younger sister, Lydia, looking very small and lost standing there in her favorite dark purple dress, craning her neck to try to see.
Although they were not usually a demonstrative family, Bertha ran and hugged her. After four long years, it was so good to see a member of her family again.
“I had to come,” Lydia said, as the crowd jostled around them.
“I’m so glad you did!” Bertha said. “I wish you had come long before.”
“You know how it is,” Lydia shrugged. “We are supposed to ignore you so you will come back to the church, to God.”
For the first time, Bertha noticed how foreign Lydia sounded. For the first time, she realized that living among the Englisch during her years in college had changed even the way she heard her sister’s voice. She had never noticed that Germanic lilt in her family’s voices before. It had merely sounded normal.
“I do not need to be brought back to God,” Bertha said, carefully. “I never left Him. In fact, I plan to serve Him even more in the coming months. I just heard yesterday, I’ve been selected to work at the hospital in Haiti, along with two other nurses I graduated with. I leave next week!”
Lydia’s face registered shock. “I thought you would come back to us when you finished your nursing training. Everyone thought you would. I never dreamed you would go through with your plan to go to Haiti. It is so very far away from us. What if something happens to you? How will we get to you?”
“I’ve worked too hard for this,” Bertha said. “I can’t move back home now. I know this is what God wants me to do. I can feel it.”
“That’s hochmut,” Lydia chastised. “You have become prideful, my sister.”
“I am not proud.” Bertha felt hurt. She and Lydia had always been close. Lydia knew how strongly she felt about helping heal others. How could that be hochmut?
“I do not want you to go.” Lydia looked like she might start crying.
“Let’s not argue, Sister,” Bertha said. “Come back with me to my room. Let me show you where I’ve been staying. I’ll introduce you to my friend, Ella, who has been so good to me. Have you eaten? I’ll make sandwiches. It will be like old times again. We’ll be together. I want to hear everything. All the details about what has been going on back home!”
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Bertha had not realized how desperately she wanted to see her sister until Lydia stood before her. Oh, how she had missed her!
“I am sorry.” Lydia shook her head. “I must get back. My Joseph will be finished with his auction at Mt. Hope soon and wanting his dinner.”
“How did you get here?”
“Joseph is such a kind man. He understood my need to see my sister. He said that I could come to the auction with him. Then when we got there, he hired an Englisch driver from Mt. Hope to bring me to your college. None of our people know that I came. I told them that I was going to the auction with Joseph—and I did. I did not lie. But I did not tell them that I would also be coming here.” Lydia looked around the auditorium. “This school you chose is a big place. I did not know where to go. I almost missed the graduation. I got lost twice and had to ask directions. Now I must go.”
Bertha saw something akin to fear in Lydia’s eyes. Her hopes of having a long talk together before she flew to Haiti wilted.
“I will walk you back to the parking lot so you won’t get lost again,” Bertha said, gently. “Will your driver still be there?”
“I told him that I would not be long,” Lydia said. “He will be waiting.”
Bertha had long legs that could eat up a mile in fifteen minutes but she took small steps now, trying to have as much time with her sister as possible.
“Tell me about home,” Bertha asked. “Is everyone well?”
“Yes,” Lydia said. “Everyone is well. Maam sometimes cries from missing you, but she tries to hide it. Our little brother still asks about you. He keeps thinking you will come back. Daett does not mention you.”
“I will write from Haiti,” Bertha said. “Do you think Daett will let Maam and little Frank read my letters?”
“I think Daett will pretend not to care that you have written, that is the way he acts about the ones you have sent so far, but I think he misses you most of all.”
“Only because I am as good as a man behind a plow,” Bertha’s voice sounded tinged with bitterness. “He misses his ‘big girl’s’ muscles.”
“That is not true. Daett cares for you and misses you terribly,” Lydia said. “I’ve seen him secretly reading your letters, but he worries about your soul.”
“Tell our father that my soul is just fine. I have the training and heart to help sick people feel better. It would be wrong for me to ignore it. God does not intend for us to bury the talents he has given us. That is scripture, Lydia.”
“Such talk confuses me,” Lydia said. “I like things to be simple. It is easier just to do what others say. I am not as brave as you.”
“You are brave in your own way. How is our mother? Is it not almost time for her to deliver?”
“Oh! That’s something I wanted to tell you about! She had the baby last week. A little girl named Anna. I did not write because I wanted to tell you myself.”
“And all is well with the baby?”
“We aren’t sure,” Lydia said.
Bertha’s heart sank. Her mother was thirty-seven. Not old, but not young either when it came to child-bearing.
“What’s wrong with the bobli?”
“We think little Anna might be a…special baby.”
Bertha’s heart sank further. Her people often referred to children with various genetic issues as “God’s special children.”
“What is the problem?”
“She appears to be mongoloid,” Lydia said. “But she is still too young for us to be certain.”
“But she is loved?” Bertha said, hoping she knew the answer. With Daett, it was not always easy to predict.
“Of course,” Lydia said. “Very much so.”
Bertha noticed that Lydia did not look as well as she could. There was a pallor about her, and dark circles beneath her eyes.
“You are not well,” Bertha said. “What is wrong?”
“It is nothing,” Lydia said.
“You are not speaking the truth.”
“I had another miscarriage last week,” Lydia said. “It was early, but still…”
Bertha’s heart dropped at this news. The one thing in the world that Lydia wanted was a child.
“Another miscarriage?” Bertha said. “How many have you had?”
“Two,” Lydia began to cry. “I wish you were not leaving. I wish you would come home and join the church. Haiti is so far away. I’m afraid something will happen, and I will never see you again.”
“It will be all right,” Bertha tried to comfort her sister. “I will write often.”
“Bad things happen in places like Haiti,” Lydia said. “I’ve read that there are people who practice something called Vodou. You will be in danger.”
“I will be fine,” Bertha reassured her. “I’m healthy and strong, and the people there will value a trained nurse. Even the people who do not believe in the same God as we do will respect someone who can help them feel better.”
“Will you come home before you leave?” Lydia said. “To say good-bye?”
“I might end up in an argument with our father, which would not be respectful. It is better that I stay here until time to go.”
“Not even to see baby Anna?” Lydia said. “She is so sweet.”
Ah, their little sister. Bertha wanted to examine the infant herself and see if she was, in truth, a mongoloid baby.
Lydia was sobbing quietly as she climbed into the driver’s car that Joseph had hired. It broke Bertha’s heart.
Bertha waved to her, biting her lip to keep from crying also, as the car pulled away. It had been so kind of Joseph to allow her this moment with her sister to say good-bye. It had also been brave of Lydia to try to come. Her heart swelled with love for her family, but as the car drove out of sight, her mind moved to practical matters, and she began to enumerate the things she needed to pack before she left next week. It was no small thing to leave for what would be at least a two-year stay, especially when she did not know for sure what would be available to her on the island.
Ella had offered to purchase whatever she needed to take with her. It was a small bonus for her four years of excellent care, Ella had said. Now that Bertha knew Ella had family money behind her and wasn’t paying her out of a small pension, she agreed with thanks.
Bertha tried to always be honest with herself. As she watched her sister’s car drive out of sight, she realized Lydia’s comment about being hochmut still stung. Perhaps it was because it was the truth. Deep in her heart, she felt like what she was doing was of much greater importance than what her mother and all the other Amish women she knew chose to do with their lives. That was wrong of her. Perhaps, she acknowledged to herself, she was a little hochmut after all.
Chapter 19
Sugarcreek
1963
In the end, Bertha could not bear to leave for such a long time without trying to see her family once more. She was not sure how she would be received. She didn’t know if anyone would even speak to her, but that didn’t matter. She needed to at least try.
As her hired driver drove her up the long driveway, her heart swelled at the sight of her beloved home. It was nothing more than a large, plain, farmhouse that her grandfather had built when he first came to Tuscarawas County, Ohio. But except for the time she had spent living with Ella, it had been the only real home she had ever known.
Within those walls, Lydia, Frank, and she had been born, had learned to walk, had been cuddled, and taught right from wrong. She loved that old house, and she loved the people within. If her father threw her out, then that was his decision. At least she would know she had tried.
All these thoughts raced through her mind as she climbed out of the driver’s car pulling her two heavy suitcases behind her.
Those who did not formally embrace the Amish faith through baptism were often allowed some contact with their families. It was not exactly forbidden for her to make this journey back home, but having watched her church’s treatment of a handful of others who c
hose not to become Amish, her expectations were not high.
Her family was sitting at the table, eating when she came through the door. Her mother’s face lit up when she saw her, and then she saw her mother glance at her father to gauge whether or not she was allowed to show her joy. Her father was not a difficult man, he wasn’t even a particularly stern man, but he was and had been very disturbed by his oldest daughter’s rebellion.
She knew in some of the other men’s minds at his church, it spoke of his lack of leadership. A father, they would think—and probably say—who was indeed the head of his family would not have raised a daughter who disobeyed by running off to nursing school.
“So, you have come home, daughter?” her father said, as she came through the door.
“For a short visit, only,” she said. “My plane leaves tomorrow.”
“Ah,” he nodded. “So, you will be flying high in the sky where God never intended a man or a woman to be.”
“That’s what I am told.”
Even though it had been four years since she had come home, her father did nothing more than shake his head with regret and continue to eat. Still, she was grateful he didn’t immediately tell her to leave.
Four years had made a lot of changes in the family. Her brother, Frank, shoved his seat back and came to hug her. They had always been close when he was a little boy, but now he was no longer small. He came up to her shoulder, and he had been only about to her waist when she left. Such a fine-looking young man!
“So,” Frank said, his voice cracking with either emotion or immature vocal cords—she wasn’t sure which. “You have not come home to stay?”
“No.” She smoothed Frank’s hair back from his forehead. “But I would be grateful if my family could give me a bed for the night. I will leave early tomorrow.”
The question hung in the air, unanswered by her father. The rest of the family waited tensely for his answer.
Bertha's Resolve: Love's Journey in Sugarcreek, Book 4 Page 7