The Time Turner by Alexandra Stone

Author:Alexandra Stone [Stone, Alexandra]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Publisher: Alexandra Stone
Published: 2017-07-16T06:00:00+00:00

Chapter Four

After Father began walking back across the field, John helped me to position myself across his shoulders once more.

His scent was not the only thing that I had noticed earlier in our walk. Having slung my arm across his back so often since my brush with death, I had come to know very well how broad his back was. He was muscular, and I could feel each of his back muscles flex with every step, even though he was bent doubled over to allow me to continue holding him for support.

Those times that we stopped for me to rest on the journey home, he would stand and stretch his back out, loping with an easy grace that I must admit was extremely alluring. Seeing him without his English compatriots, he became just another shy Amish man who would not have been out of place at my family’s dinner table one Sunday after church.

As we sat under the shade of an oak-tree, our talk turned to what we desired out of life.

“Honestly,” he said after I asked his ambitions, “I want what most any man in our community wants. I want to marry, have some children, and live a life that is pleasing to God.”

“You don’t want anything else? Don’t you want to see more than just Indiana, or occasionally Michigan or Ohio? To maybe travel, and see the rest of the country?”

“Honestly, no,” he answered me. “I am happy with my simple life. I mean, I guess there is always the chance that I could travel. I have not yet been baptized, so I am not held by the Ordnung, but I still feel as though I am tied to this place…to my family…to my home. You know?”

“Yeah, I do know.” I highly suspect that every Amish youth who is still in the age of rumspringa is considering if they will stay with our people. The problem with leaving our people is that if we join the English world, and we will be separated from salvation. Our teachers have made sure that we understand that the church is saved, and to be separate and apart from the church is to be separated from the grace of God. Plus, if we were to leave the community, we would be separated from our families, and have to live out our lives separated from them.

There are many of us, however, who would like to see what the English world really offers, and not just the parties with beer and cigarettes that we have all been to. Because we only go to school through the eighth grade, many of us feel that if we leave, we will not have the education or knowledge to make it in the English world.

After I rose from my rest and placed my arm around John’s shoulders once more, we continued walking toward my home. As we walked and continued with our conversation, I came to realize that I had judged him too harshly when I first saw him.

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