Although it was a bit chilly to be out in the farm for so long I had a great time listening to David Kline talk. I share the love of mashed potatoes with him. It is probably one of the only american food that I love. I am pretty sure the ones that I have had are only half as good as what he is used to eating. The way he described how the farm-made butter melts and compliments the mashed potato made my mouth water.He said that his mother used to make them with only 5 simple ingredients. It is incredible how 5 simple ingredients come together to make such a delightful dish. He made a connection between the simple ingredients coming together to make a great dish and simple words put together to make a captivating passage/text. I agree with him, sometimes the simplest of words have the most impact. It is like the 6 word story by Ernest Hemingway that he mentioned: ” For sale: baby shoes. Never worn.”

Driving to David Kline’s farm was a series of flashbacks. From Wooster to Apple Creek I paid little notice to the passing countryside, having passed it so many times before, but past Apple Creek I was sad that I couldn’t enjoy the view. The rolling hills now were painted with the dusty orange and washed-out yellow of autumn. At one point we drove through a promenade of tall trees, I couldn’t tell what species they were, but their crowns were all a crisp fiery orange, as if a pumpkin patch had decided to renounce the confines of rotundity and leap up to the skies.

When we arrived to Criswell and Carr, that intersection at a sharp angle, I remembered having driven down to a farm in those parts earlier in the month to have my walnuts hulled. I talk about walnuts too much, perhaps, but I enjoy them, and navigating Amish country without a GPS was such an interesting experience. Other clients at the farm had filled wagons attached to their buggies with burlap sacks of walnuts– my meager 10 pound collection of the nuts paled by comparison. These clients made good conversation with the family that was running this business, and with each other. This– gathering walnuts and travelling down to the Yoder farm to have them hulled– was a tradition within the area, not just for the Amish but the larger Wayne-Holmes county community as the whole. I was happy to have been a part of such a bucolic tradition and to remember my experience on the way to the Kline farm.

Upon our arrival, I didn’t know what I was expecting but a number of things stood out to me: the compactness of it all, with buildings huddled relatively close together and to the roads, the homestead resembling a hamlet among the surrounding acres of land. The new house had a spacious porch with raw support beams that smelled like fresh lumber. The inside of the first barn we saw felt like the bowels of a great merchant ship, with a maze of wooden structures, and pens dimly lit by sparse sunbeams, and the warm, earthy smell of animals. The barn cats made themselves known soon after we arrived, and enamored all of us while Mr. Kline showed us around the barn. They reminded me of my uncle’s cats on his farm– less domestic and more a feature of the land; a constant. Regarding barn cats, the question seems less, “will there be any?”, and more, “How many will there be?”.

Sedentary agriculture begets close contact with animals, which in turn seems to engender a fondness for them, and Mr. Kline has shown in writing and in speech his appreciation for all life. His love for birds goes without saying, and he loves his cattle enough to see them as more than a money-maker. Something that I marveled at was that his farm only raised enough animals to provide for the family. There was little to do with profits. Here, one farmed for the enjoyment of it and the life that came with it. The deliberateness of it all would be enough to stump even Thoreau.

After meeting Mr. Kline, I determined to take that sociology course on the Amish the next time it would be offered. His book does tell a lot about his lifestyle and his worldview as shaped by his culture, but there’s more that I would like to know about Amish and general religious approaches to the natural world. The emphasis on separation from the buzz of modern life and on close neighborly and familial relationships, and how those values have intersected with environmentalism, are particularly interesting. While we listened to Mr. Kline in the other barn, I couldn’t help but fell warm and fuzzy when he described how sometimes they clean it up to have weddings and church services. Seeing the grandchildren spying on us with innocent curiosity from outside the barn and from atop the hay bales within the barn, and even the little girl playing in a feed trough outside, convinced me that I was in an entirely different world from the one I had woke up in earlier that day.

I step out into the chilly November air. It’s damp and everything smells like mud, manure, and horses. To my right, there is a flock of about seven guinea fowl scurrying into small paddock with two ponies, one dark brown and one dapple grey. Just about fifty feet in front of me, a horse hitched to a small buggy and cats are appearing out of nowhere. A sense of peace and serenity washes over me as I take all of it in. The absence of animals on campus is very stressful and being in such  a haven is almost overwhelming. We are only just outside of Apple Creek, Ohio, the next town over from Wooster, but I feel as if I’ve been transported much much further.

We step into the dairy barn and are greeted by more and more cats, mewing and weaving through our legs. Dusk was gathering and the barn is cool and dark. I can see dairy cows through the open doorway at the back, milling about, ready for their evening milking. Cats of all ages scamper around our feet as our host, David, tells us about Amish farming. Frankly, I was very distracted by the cats and the cows, and I was devising a way to take the smallest kitten home with me. David mentions buttery mashed potatoes, and suddenly my mouth is watering and my stomach is growling. I can almost taste the creamy Amish butter and smell warm potatoes. When is dinner, again?

We exit the dairy barn the way we came in and head up the path to the open storage barn. There is an old rusted basketball hoop on the left hand wall and another leaning against a post in the middle of the floor. It smells strongly of sweet hay with undertones of horses and manure. It’s colder in this barn and the wind cuts through the holes in my loose-knit sweater. I hear children and turn around to see a boy, about five-years-old running up the path, an older girl, probably around seven,  in a dress and rain boots chasing behind him. I watch them play hide-and-seek, chasing each other around the barn. I look up and see another boy, hiding in the stacks of hay bails on the wall. I stifle a giggle. Once again, I am distracted by friendly beasts.

 

It did’t really hit me until we were on the car ride to his farm, that I realized we were visiting the author of a book we are currently reading in class, nonetheless his farm in located a short drive from the campus. A sense of excitement and slight nervousness came over me. I was hoping that I would refrain from engaging in any mannerisms that would possibly offend an Amish person, given that I know so little about them and their culture. Then, I wondered if the clothing I was wearing would be offensive or inappropriate in some way.

As soon as I saw who David was, that feeling of anxiousness quickly disintegrated. When he began to speak, his tone was soft and gentle, full of welcomeness. Another thing that allowed me to let go of nervousness was when I stepped outside of the car and looked around, the way the house and the barn were set in context with the driveway immediately reminded me of how one of my good friend, Patrick’s farm house and barn were arranged. My mind began to fill with memories, like when I would step out of my parents’ car onto their driveway and hearing Patrick’s dad yell, “Get some gloves on Matt!” referring to how I was about to be put to work lifting hay bales before it was time to play.

I regret basing my anxiousness on the fear of the unknown. Looking at this trip in hindsight, it was entirely a learning experience. Perhaps most important, I walked away from this visit with a mindset I never thought I would have had previous to the trip. Amish culture may have some features to it that the world should consider, looking towards sustainability and our future on planet Earth. I was amazed by how self-sufficient his farm left him as far as food goes, and even the profits he is able to make. The thing that really stuck with me though is the openness to knowledge, culture, and modernity that Kline endorses while maintaining the ability to use these things as a means to achieve something at the end of the day. Kline’s view on Amish culture to me, seems built on the absence of greed, low impact on the world in just about every way, and balancing tradition with prosperity.

 

After meeting David Kline, and visiting his farm, I realized how observant he must be of his surroundings. In many of his essays, Kline talks about seeing animals around his farm and property, such as owls and other birds flying over. When we visiting his farm, I did not notice any of the animals he had talked about because for me there was too much else going on to observe rather than looking to the sky for birds, or looking in the trees for owl nests. He must really watch the sky while he is out working and keep an eye to the trees to see the owl ears peeking out of nests that he describes in his essay “Night Hunters.” I would have liked to see some of these things while we were there, but I was too distracted by the plethora of other sites. I was busy admiring the elaborate barns and houses, and the many animals that were running by. I was especially distracted by the cats, who came running out to see us as soon as we headed towards the barn. I wanted to pick them all up and take them home with me. I was also busy admiring the horses and the landscape, not bisected by power lines and telephone poles like everywhere else. I think David Kline must be very aware of his surroundings and other living things to be able to see even more past all of the things happening around his farm already.

A cold wind blows through the old oak barn. Before reaching this point it must have blown past the grazing Belgium draft horses and the pony hitched to a cart, tied up at the edge of the barn. It would have blown past the jersey’s lining up to be milked and the fermented corn feed being placed in throughs. All of these smells now linger in the loft of the barn. They are comforting much like a warm blanket. Cats are longingly meowing, cows are anxiously mooing, and horses are neighing. These are typical farm sounds. Beyond the noise of the farm, the chirping of birds can be heard. This is such a peaceful place. These sounds are soon washed out but the roar of a generator, which is used to power a few lights and a milking machine. The roar is a reminder that this is a working farm. This farm is a business operation, but with one glance it is easy to tell how much more it really is. This farm is a home. It supports a family and a way of life. The Amish way of life could be considered simple, but it is anything but that. Each decision must be carefully weighed in terms of economic gain, how it will impact the family, and how it will affect the community. This generator while not complying with most of the outside world’s view of the Amish allows Kline’s family to continue to live the way they want. Without the generator, the farm would not be profitable. The conscious decision to use power allows the Kline family to not give up their entire lifestyle. As I fiddle with the car keys in my pocket I realize this is not a conscious decision I have ever made. I’ve never stopped and thought about my own dependency on the grid. It is a dependency so intertwined with my own life that I forget it is there. As David Kline talks about his life I wonder how different my life would be if I was more conscious of my use of electricity.