Why I Left the Amish

by Saloma Miller Furlong

  When Susan joined the young people, she immediately began dating one boy after another. I wondered how she was so popular when she was one of “Sim's girls,” too. I got a few rides with her and her dates before she got tired of me. She criticized me for talking too much. Before a month was out, she was going steady with a boy named Robert, and then almost immediately, Sarah and Sonny started going steady as well. I felt not only ancient, but well on my way to becoming a spinster.

  One night at a singing, I was asked for a date with Milo's Mel's Dan, who is a cousin to Sonny. I found him fun to talk to on the way home. It seemed good to have my own ride again.

  When we reached my home, we went through the usual rituals of going to bed, clothed. As soon as we started to shmunzle, I decided the ride had not been worth it. His kisses made me want to turn my back and go to sleep. At least, I thought as the endless night dragged on, he didn't push his luck to see how far he could go.

  WHEN DAN ASKED ME for another date a week later, I was astounded. No one had asked me for a second date for so long that I caught myself saying yes just because I was so flattered. Besides, I really needed a ride home. And that night, his kisses didn't seem so bad. He seemed to like to listen to me talk in the buggy, and before I knew it, he'd driven me home nine times in a row.

  Was this love, I wondered? It felt more like a habit. Not at all what I'd expected.

  The following week when I was working at one of the six houses I cleaned, I got a call. It was a man, and he was panting. His voice was nearly inaudible. I could barely make out the words: “Hi this is Dan—I was just wondering if it would be all right to go steady.”

  Stunned, I pressed the receiver to my ear, listening to his loud breathing. Could I say yes? I could already feel the weight of many burdens slipping away from me. Would it be so bad? My own home, my own babies. But with Dan? Night after night, wishing he were someone else? For the rest of my life?

  Dan interrupted my thoughts when he spoke. “You don't have to answer me right now—you can tell me later.”

  Deep in my heart, I knew what my answer would be. “Okay,” I said, and I was ready to add, “I already know what my answer is.”

  But Dan had hung up.

  When I came home from work that day, Sarah was in the basement kitchen cooking a new concoction with tomatoes and zucchini. The aroma of the spices she was using was tantalizing even to my taste buds, and I didn't like tomatoes.

  Sarah turned around when I came down the stairs and said, “Lomieeee,” with a big smile on her face.

  “What?” I asked, with a straight face. I thought, Darn! She knows!

  “You know . . . Come on . . . I already know about it.”

  “About what?”

  “Didn't Dan call you at work today?”

  “What if he did, why do you care? And how would you know?”

  “Sonny called me at work today and told me. Well? You are going to say yes, aren't you?”

  I could have said I didn't want to tell her, or that I had to think about it longer. But, instead I said, “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I don't love him.”

  She looked reproachfully at me. “Lomie! You've had nine dates with him. Why did you lead him on if you don't feel anything for him?”

  I felt a cramp knot my stomach. Because I hated to ride home with you and Sonny? Because I'll do anything to get away from Datt? “I—I was trying to find out if I loved him or not,” I said lamely.

  “What do you mean by love?” Sarah asked.

  “Love is what you and Sonny have. I can see it in your faces.”

  Sarah said, “What Sonny and I have is unusual. It's different for everyone, you know. Would you even recognize love? Maybe you need to think about how you feel about Susan and me both going steady when you aren't.” Sarah's voice followed me up the stairs. “You may not get another chance like this for a long time.”

  “It is my decision, not yours!” I shouted down.

  “I just hope you make the right one,” Sarah called.

  Her words echoed in my mind all the way to my room.

  I made the wrong choice. That Sunday when Dan drove me home, I said yes when I meant no. I was glad the dark hid the lie in my face.

  WHEN I CLEANED THE BIG houses in Chesterland, I sometimes watched soap operas on television in the afternoons. I thought the troubles in the soap operas were glamorous compared to my own life.

  One day I found a Yankee magazine at work. I looked at all the pictures of New England. I had liked pictures of New England ever since I saw them in my seventh-grade geography book. Ohio had woods and fields like New England's, but I'd never seen mountains before. I liked the mountains of New England that cradled farms and towns in their foothills.

  My favorite of all the states was Vermont, so I read every article I could find about it. In this copy of Yankee magazine, I saw an ad for a magazine called Vermont Life. I thought about sending for it, but I hesitated, knowing I would have to use my allowance money. But a week later when I was in the same house, I found the address again and sent for the magazine.

  Two weeks later, the first one arrived. We rarely got magazines—mostly just the Farmer's Almanac. As usual, Datt didn't seem to notice what I had done. Mem seemed surprised when she saw the magazine. “Why are you spending your money on frivolous things like that?” she asked. But later, I found her with the magazine open.

  Alone in my room, I gazed at all the pictures and read the magazine from cover to cover. My favorite picture was taken in North Pomfret. It showed an old Cape-style house with a birch tree on one side and a maple on the other. The branches were bare under a deep blue sky, with the last of the leaves scattered on the green grass. Off in the distance, cotton-white clouds hung above the hilly landscape. Near the horizon, mountains touched the fluffy clouds. It reminded me of the psalm from the Bible: I will lift mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help.

  When I turned the page, I saw a picture of a stream running underneath a covered bridge, with a woman sitting on a stone wall nearby. Beyond the covered bridge was an old white house with dark red shutters. The caption read, “What is the young lady thinking as she watches the Green River pass underneath a covered bridge south of Guilford Center?”

  I knew what I would be thinking: that I had made it to the land of my dreams, many miles away from my troubles. I would not leave the spot on the stone wall until I was sure I wouldn't wake and find I was dreaming.

  NOW THAT THREE OF HIS daughters were going steady with boys and Lizzie was almost twenty-one, Datt began to lecture us girls every evening about the importance of obedience, followed up with German quotes from the Bible that none of us understood—and then his monologue would become jumbled and cease to make any sense at all. But we didn't dare walk away, lest we trigger his violence.

  When Lizzie was twenty-one years old, considered “of age” in the community, she surprised us all and moved in with Amanda, whom she had befriended at the few singings Joe had taken her to. Amanda's parents were willing to take Lizzie in as long as she paid room and board. Not long after she moved in with Amanda's family, Lizzie found out that Amanda's father and our mother had dated when they were young. She felt that she had found her “rightful” sister, or the sister she would have had if Mem and Amanda's father had gotten married. Lizzie had fancied herself adopted ever since she was old enough to understand the concept. It was her way of accounting for always feeling like an outsider within the family.

  I felt guilty that I had not been a better sister to Lizzie; at the same time, I envied her new freedom.

  Datt now focused on the rest of us. Susan and I most often bore the brunt of his rage, because Sarah had a sneaky way of not getting caught, even though she did many of the same things we did. He thought Sarah was the only obedient daughter he had. He held a grudge against Susan for calling the police when he had hurt Lizzie's leg several years before. I had been at work that day. When I came home, Lizzie had a s
wollen leg that she couldn't walk on, and Datt had a bright red burn mark on his arm.

  Lizzie had been ironing when Datt came after her because she refused to sit down to eat at the table. She held up the iron and said, “Datt, if you come near me, I will burn you with this iron!” He kept coming at her and she burned his arm. That still didn't stop Datt. He kept hitting her.

  Mem kept yelling, “Sim, shtopp sell! Sim, shtopp sell!” He wouldn't stop. Susan ran next door and called the police.

  Lizzie dropped the iron and ran for the door to get away from Datt. He caught her leg in the door and slammed the door on her leg over and over, nearly breaking it. By the time the policeman came, the struggle was over. Datt was sitting in his rocking chair, and Lizzie had dragged herself backwards up the stairway, to her room. Her leg was bruised from below her knee all the way to her hip.

  The policeman came upstairs and looked at Lizzie's bruised leg. He asked her if she wanted to go to the hospital. She said no. He asked her if she wanted to press charges and she said no.

  Lizzie told me later that she and Datt made a confession in a church service that was held at our house. Bishop Dan had Datt make his confession first, and then Lizzie was brought in to kneel down and make her confession. She said she could only focus on the pain in her leg, which was nearly unbearable.

  Perhaps it was because Susan had called the police, or because she wore the “slickest” clothing, with shorter dresses and smaller koppa, but it seemed like Datt was after Susan more than anyone.

  One day, when I came home from work, I found Susan and Sarah standing by the cedar chest in their room. Susan was sobbing.

  “I was ironing,” she told me, “and Datt asked me out of nowhere why I comb my hair the way I do.” She drew a shuddering breath. “I didn't know what to say that wouldn't trigger him to go crazy, so I didn't say anything. He kept shouting, ‘Answer me! Answer me!’ Finally I said, ‘I don't know.’”

  “‘Well, why don't you know?’ Datt yelled at me. And when I didn't answer, he jumped up out of his rocking chair and started hitting me all over, the way he does when he goes crazy.”

  Sarah and I didn't say anything. We knew.

  “I refused to let him know it hurt, so I braced myself and let him hit me. By the time Mem got there, I was starting to faint. The last thing I remember was hearing her shouting, ‘Sim, you have to stop! You are going to kill her!’”

  Tears choked her voice. Susan put her hands over her face. I cried too, feeling helpless and trapped by Datt's violence. When he came after someone, there was no fighting back—he was physically strong, but when he was in one of his rages, he was as strong as a bull, and just as wild.

  “We have to do something,” I said through my own tears.

  “But what?” Sarah asked. As the three of us stood there, crying around the cedar chest at the foot end of Sarah's bed, I thought how much the chest was like a coffin. It was as if our hope had died in the chest. Our fear of Datt's violence kept us trapped so that we could not even imagine freedom.

  ON THE NEXT CHURCH SUNDAY, at a service in the Shrocks' living room, Bishop Dan asked all the church members to stay seated. This was a common practice at the end of church services, when there were issues to be discussed by the church members only. I had always been curious about what actually happened behind those closed doors. Now that I was a member of the church, I would find out.

  The realization of what was happening crept up on me slowly. First I noticed Datt leave with the children and young folks who hadn't yet joined church, and I thought maybe he was going to the barn for a break.

  When all was quiet, Bishop Dan began talking about “the brother” who had come to him and wanted to make things right. Then he said, “He wants to confess that he lost his temper the other day and hit one of the daughters.” Bishop Dan paused, then continued, “Sim was talking to her and she wasn't listening, so he told her to answer him. She tried running from him, and therefore he hit her. Now he wants to make his confession, since he feels he went a bit too far.”

  I could feel my face getting red with shame when I realized this “brother” was Datt. Then the bishop added his own commentary: “But it's not entirely Sim's fault. If the wife and children would be more obedient, then Sim wouldn't have this problem. Since that is the case, I will take his confession sitting down, instead of having him get on his knees, if no one has any objection to that.” With that, Bishop Dan sent the deacon around to ask everyone's approval for this decision.

  I thought I would die of shame and indignation. Bishop Dan was giving us a vote about whether Datt should confess sitting or kneeling! If someone disagrees, will he have Datt kneel for his confession after all? What if someone disagrees with the whole charade?

  The torture of sitting there on the backless bench with the deacon shuffling closer and closer to me, getting one submissive yes after another from the girls before me, was almost more than I could bear. Then he stood in front of me and it was my turn to say yes. I knew that women in the church were not allowed to oppose anything. They had to tell their husbands if they disagreed with the policies of the church, and then it was the men's duty to relay that information to the bishop. According to this policy, I had no choice. But to say yes was a lie. I was fighting back the tears that wanted to spill out of my eyes and down my cheeks, and I tried to find my voice. No sound came out, even though my mouth had made the motion.

  The deacon leaned closer and said, “What?”

  I had to live through the agony twice. I wanted to shout, No! I don't agree with any part of this because that is not how it happened! She didn't try to run away at all because he was hitting her so hard, she couldn't! He didn't even tell you that “the daughter” fainted from him hitting her! Now do you hear me?

  Instead, I swallowed hard and tried again. This time I managed to muster something close to a yes, and the deacon shuffled on to the next person.

  When Datt was brought in, he had his hat in his hands, and he bent his head so far down, I wondered how he could walk. I imagined this was his posture the day he arrived to see Mem when she was living at her aunt Em's house before they were married. This dejected form had convinced Mem to marry Datt, even against her besser gewisser (better knowing).

  Bishop Dan had Datt sit on the bench in front of him and repeat something in German I didn't understand. Datt said it in a voice so meek and childlike, I thought that if I didn't know him I would wonder how he could be violent at all. Then the bishop pardoned him and Datt took his original seat.

  I held in all my feelings until later that day, when I asked Mem if a woman had ever opposed anything in the church. She said, “Not that I know of.”

  “How is a woman supposed to talk to her husband when she isn't even sitting with him, anyway?” I asked. “By the time she has a chance to say something to him after the church service, the decisions are already made.”

  “I've often wondered that myself,” Mem said in a musing voice. Then she seemed to catch herself and she added, “Oh Lomie, if you only knew how much better off you are without asking these questions, maybe you wouldn't ask them.”

  I asked, “So what is my way of communicating to the bishop if I disagree? I don't have a husband.”

  Mem sighed. “It's supposedly through Datt.”

  I just looked at her for a long moment, then said, “So, I had to lie? Because I had to do it, it's not considered a lie, is that it?” My voice rose with the panic I felt at the injustice of it all.

  “Oh Lomie, you are just making it harder on yourself,” Mem said.

  I went to my room and lay down. I couldn't even talk to Sarah and Susan about what had happened, because they weren't church members yet, so it was forbidden. Exhausted, I fell asleep.

  I dreamed that I was in the picture in my Vermont Life magazine. I was under the maple tree's bare limbs, with the fallen leaves still fresh on the grass. I stood there and looked into the house, knowing I would go in, but first I wanted to run down the big hil
l toward the mountains on the horizon. As I started running, I discovered I could run like I had in my childhood dreams. I floated just above the green, green grass and landed lightly, then pushed off and floated down the hill to my next landing place. I thought, “I have dreamed this so many times, but this time it's real! I am as free as a butterfly!” I sailed along toward the mountains, feeling the breeze through my hair streaming out behind me.

  When I first heard my name, it was part of the dream, and I turned to see who was calling me. Then I couldn't see the maple tree and the house anymore, and I wondered if I had gotten lost.

  “Lomie!” This time the voice was insistent and impatient, accompanied by knocking at the door. I knew I was waking from a dream, and I wanted so much to stay in the dream instead of on my bed in Mem and Datt's house. Then someone shook me, and I looked up into Sarah's face. She said, “Dan is here.”

  I had to drag myself away from the dream to comb my hair, put on my kopp, and smooth out the wrinkles in my dress before Dan came up to my room. More than ever, I realized how Dan didn't belong in my future if I ever dared to follow my dreams.

  Wrapping a Plan

  Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined.

  HENRY DAVID THOREAU

  David pulled into a gas station in Massachusetts. The trip was getting long, and I felt sorry that he and Tim still had to drive after they dropped me off. They would not arrive home until after midnight. After refueling the car, we decided to eat a quick meal. I asked David if he wanted me to drive, and he said it would be a good idea, given that he had three hours to go with Tim after he dropped me off.

  Back on the road, Tim became restless and asked why he had had to come along. I asked him whether he was sorry he did, and he said, no, he was glad he had come. He bounced around in the back seat before finally finding a comfortable position for the remainder of the trip.

  When we finally pulled up to Green Street, and David helped me bring my luggage to my room on the third floor, I kissed him good-bye and asked him to call me when they arrived home, even if it woke me up.