The Postcard (4 page)

The best mirror is an old friend.

German proverb

One

S
omething as insignificant as sleeping past the alarm— getting a late start—always set things spinning out of kilter.

The hurrier I go, the behinder I get
, Rachel thought, feeling awful frustrated about having to rush around. Quickly, she washed her face, glancing in the oval mirror above the sink. That done, she brushed her longer-than-waist-length hair, parting it down the middle and working it into the plain, low bun at the back of her neck, the way she arranged it each and every morning.

She had lived all her life in rural Bird-in-Hand, in the heart of Pennsylvania Dutch country. Her parents and siblings had found great fulfillment in working the land, all of them. But, as was their custom, only the youngest married brothers had been given acreage, divvying up sections of the original family farm. There was only so much soil to go around, what with commercialism creeping in, choking out precious land—the very reason Levi and Esther Glick had packed up and bid farewell to their close-knit families. All for the sake of owning a parcel of their own.

Still, the historic village and outlying area had offered everything she and her now-grown brothers and sisters ever wanted, and more. There was the grace of swaying willows, the tranquillity of clear, chirping brooks, the honesty of wide-open skies, and the blessing and abundant love of the People.

“Our Father God, thy name we praise,” she whispered, starting the day—late as it was—with a prayer of thanksgiving.

Reverently, she placed the white prayer veiling on her head and turned to see her husband standing near the window, his tall, stocky frame blocking the path of the sun.

“We best hurry,” she said, moving to his side. “Can’t be late for market.”

“We’ll take the shortcut, then we won’t hafta rush so,” he said, drawing her close.

“The shortcut?” Rachel was cautious about the roads that led to the Crossroad—a dangerous intersection—where a number of fatal accidents had occurred in the past.

Jacob reassured her. “It’ll be all right. Just this once.”

When she relaxed in his arms, he whispered, “What if we moved to Ohio a bit sooner?”

“How soon?” Her heart beat hard with excitement.

“Say late December . . . after Christmas maybe.”

Delighted, she reminded him of her cousin’s many letters.

“Esther says there’s still ample farmland where they are.” She thought ahead, counting the months. “And the new baby’ll be two months old by then, if I carry full term.”

Jacob nodded thoughtfully. “A right gut time then, prob’ly.”

Rachel couldn’t deny that Esther’s persistent letters had caused a stirring in her, and now to hear Jacob talk so!

“There’s plenty of time left to discuss the details.” He looked down at her, his eyes serious. “The woodworking shop brings in nearly more business than I can handle, so we’ll have enough money by December to make the move.”

“The Lord willing,” she whispered. God’s will was always uppermost in their minds, yet she longed for the cutting sweet smell of newly mown hay and the earthy scent of cows herded into the barn, ready for milking.

Rachel’s parents and both sets of grandparents, clear back to the sturdiest aging branches of the family tree, had been dairy farmers. Some of them had raised chickens and pigs, too, spending grueling hours in the field while they spread manure to insure bountiful crops.

According to snippets of stories she’d overheard growing up, there was only one of her ancestors who’d forsaken his upbringing. Considering the two hundred or so conservative folk connected to her through blood ties or marriage, losing a single member was ever so slight compared to some families. Age-old gossip had it that Great-uncle Gabriel, her mother’s uncle, had turned his back on the Plain community sometime during his twenty-seventh year, long past the time a young man should’ve joined church, making his commitment before God and the People.

There were various spins on the story. Some said Gabe Esh was a self-appointed evangelist. Others had it that he’d been given a so-called “divine revelation”—only to die weeks later.

As far as Rachel was concerned, no one seemed to know exactly what happened, though she wasn’t the sort of person to solicit questions. Truth was, most everyone closely acquainted with Gabe had long since passed through the gates of Glory. Except, of course, Old Order Bishop Seth Fisher and his wife, and Jacob’s and Rachel’s parents, though none of them seemed inclined to waste time discussing a “rabble-rouser,” which was just what one of the preachers had said of Gabe in a sermon some years back. And there was Martha Stoltzfus—Gabe’s only living sister. But the brusque and bitter woman refused to speak of him, upholding
die Meindung
—the shunning that must’ve been placed on him, for what reason Rachel did not know. Lavina Troyer was rumored to have been a schoolmate of Gabe Esh, though none of that was talked about anymore.

So there was a broken bough on Rachel’s family tree, and not a single Esh, Yoder, or Zook cared to recall the reason for the fracture.

She headed downstairs to cook the usual breakfast for her dear ones. Abandoning thoughts of the past, she turned her attention to the future as she scrambled up nine large eggs, made cornmeal mush and fried potatoes, and set out plenty of toast, butter, grape jelly, and apple butter. Just knowing that she and Jacob and the children could move so far from home, that a Bible-based conservative group was expecting their arrival—or so Esther had said—filled her heart with gladness. The future was ever so bright.

Rachel and Jacob sat down with the children to eat, but the minute Jacob was finished, he dashed outside to load the market wagon. Rachel gently encouraged the children not to dawdle as she washed and dried the dishes.

Soon, Jacob was calling to them from the yard. “Time to load up the family.
Kumme
—come now!”

Rachel dried her hands and gathered up her basket of needlework. It was always a good thing to keep busy at market, especially if there was a lull, though that would hardly be the case on a summer Saturday. Tourists generally flocked to the well-known Farmers Market this time of year.

Spying the letter to Cousin Esther on the buffet, she snatched it up just as Jacob came indoors. “I think we’re all ready,” she said, shooing the children in the direction of the back door.

The Yoders settled in for a twenty-minute ride, by way of the shortcut. An occasional breeze took the edge off the sun’s warm rays as Jacob hurried the horse. Still, they were forced to reflect on the day, allowing the primitive mode of transportation to slow them down, calm them, too. Truth be told, Rachel was glad they still drove horse and buggy instead of a car, like a few of her young Beachy relatives. The thought of buzzing highways and wide thoroughfares made her shiver with fright. She hoped and prayed Holmes County might be far less bustling.

“Plenty of time left,”
Jacob had said about scheduling their moving day. More than anything, she wanted to bring up the topic as they rode along. But she thought better of it and kept her peace.

It was Aaron who did most of the talking. Jabbering was more like it. After several minutes of the boy’s idle babbling, Jacob reprimanded him. “That’ll be enough, son.”

Instantly, Aaron fell silent, but Rachel heard Annie giggle softly, the two of them still jostling each other as youngsters will.

Children are a gift from God
, she thought, glancing back at the darling twosome. How very happy they all were in this life they’d chosen. And her husband’s quiver was surely on its way to being full of offspring.

She allowed her thoughts to wander back to each of her children’s home births. Seemed like just yesterday that Mattie Beiler, Hickory Hollow’s most prominent midwife, had come at dawn to help deliver Aaron. Rachel kindly rejected her mother’s suggestion to have a hex doctor come to assist—even after twenty hours of excruciating labor. Her firstborn would make his appearance when he was good and ready, she’d decided, in spite of Susanna’s pleadings. For once, Rachel had spoken up and was glad of it.

One year and two months later, Annie, all sweet-like, had arrived with the mildest, shortest labor on record in the area—around midnight. No sympathy healer was hinted at for Annie’s birth. And no midwife.

Rachel cherished the memories, yet tried to lay aside her ongoing concern over the powwow doctors. Especially one
die blo Yonie
—Blue Johnny.
Dokder
was the name the children called him, though she knew he was not a real doctor at all. Not Amish either.

The tall man with bushy brown hair came a-knocking on one door or another nearly every Tuesday afternoon. Last month, he’d come to the Yoder house quite unexpectedly. He’d reeked of the musty scent of pipe tobacco as he rubbed his little black box up and down her son’s spine and over his shoulders, never waiting for Rachel’s consent whatsoever. Yet in no time, he knew about a tiny wart, hardly visible, growing on Aaron’s left hand.

“To get rid of it, just roast the feet of a chicken and rub the wart with them, then bury the chicken feet under the eaves of your house, and the wart will disappear,” the man had said, eyeing her curiously.

Because of her wariness, Rachel never roasted any such chicken feet. She honestly wished she hadn’t opened the door to Blue Johnny that day, what with Jacob working clear across the barnyard in his woodshop. Even so, she was too timid to speak up. Such folk, calling themselves faith healers—with charms for this and herbal potions for that—had frequently called on Plain folk for as long as she could remember. Some of them were Amish themselves, though the powwow doctors among her own family had died out years ago. She herself had been looked upon as a possible choice because of certain giftings manifest in her as a young child. But due to her extreme shyness, she had been passed over.

As for Blue Johnny, she felt uneasy around him and others who claimed “healing gifts,” even though he’d graciously cured Lizzy of rheumatism years ago. He’d come to the Zook farmhouse and taken the disease away by tying a blue woolen yarn around her sister’s painful limbs, repeating a charm three times. In the process, the man had taken the disease on himself. And she knew that he had, because he limped out of the house and down the back steps, while Lizzy was free of pain in the space of five minutes!

Most of the Plain folk in the area never gave powwow practices a second thought. Sympathy healers and folk medicine came with the territory, brought to Central Pennsylvania by early Dutch settlers. Such healers were believed to have been imparted gifts by the Holy Spirit and the holy angels, but there were others—a small minority—who believed the healing gifts were anything but divinely spiritual, that they were occultic in nature.

Rachel knew precisely where her own uncertainties concerning powwow doctors had come from—an old column in the
Budget
, the popular Ohio-based newspaper for Amish readers. There had been an article written by one Jacob J. Hershberger, a Beachy Amish bishop living in Norfolk, Virginia, back in 1961. Esther had stumbled onto it when she cleaned out the attic before their Ohio move.

For some reason, her cousin had thought the article important enough to save, so she’d passed it along to Rachel and Jacob. The writer had spoken out strongly against enchantment and powwowing, describing such as the work of evil spirits. Jacob Hershberger had also admonished Amish communities everywhere to abandon their superstitious beliefs “handed down by godless heathen.” He instructed them to “lay on hands, anoint with oil, call the elders of the church, and pray” for the sick as God’s Word teaches, instead of turning to witchcraft—powwow doctoring.

After reading the column, Rachel initially wondered if there might be some truth to the notion that powwow doctors received their abilities from the devil rather than God. Could that be the reason she’d always had such a peculiar feeling around them? Yet if that was so, why didn’t others in the community feel uneasy—the way she did?

Since Rachel didn’t have the courage to speak up and share her apprehension with either her bishop or the preachers, she was glad she could confide in at least one other person besides Jacob. Esther was always kind enough to say, “Jah, I understand,” or gently beg to differ with her. Esther was either black or white on any issue, and Rachel had come to trust that forthright approach. It was that kind of thoughtful and compassionate friendship they’d enjoyed throughout the years.

Rachel gazed lovingly at her husband’s strong hands as he held the reins, urging the horse onward. She looked ahead to the narrow two-lane road, taking in the barley and wheat fields on either side. Bishop Glick’s place, with its myriad rose arbors bedecking the side yards, would soon be coming up on the left-hand side. Then another two miles or so and they’d pass the stone mill and the homestead where she’d grown up amidst a houseful of people.

She marveled at the beauty around her—the sun playing off trees abundant with broad green leaves and the wild morning glory vines entwined along the roadside. Ambrosial fragrances of honeysuckle and roses stirred in the summer air.