The Night Amish

I recently had the opportunity to experience life through the perspective of our nation's Amish. My long-standing fascination with this group is no passing phase: I was born in Pennsylvania, and feel a sort of kindred bond with this enigmatic group. It transcends race, religion and zipper utilization. My journey into the heart of the Amish lifestyle was one of self-discovery, patience building and enlightenment. I’d like to share my story with you.

Huh. It sounds so noble and Discovery Channel-worthy when I put it like that. Flowery prose aside, we had some bad thunderstorms and our power went out. For three hours! Right before my Sunday night TV shows came on! I know! It was awful. The things I go through just to have something to write. So I figured, hey, I’m curious about the Amish. Once while some of my family and I were at an aquarium, we noticed there was an Amish family there, too. After a few minutes, my aunt nudged me. "The Amish are watching the fish," she said. "We're watching the Amish. Who's watching us?" But being curious about them doesn’t mean I think I could cut it as one. The power outage and more have convinced me that most likely, livin' the vida Amish is not for me.

I’m sure there are perks to being Amish. Like, that tree the thunderstorm took out in my backyard. Were I Amish, I could no doubt grab a couple of my fellow Amish and whip up a barn out of it in no time. You never know when you'll need a barn. And say what you will about Amish clothing, the fact remains that black is very slimming. However, with all the butter churning that'd be going on, your arms would probably be toned within an inch of their lives anyway. Also, you get to be around horses a good deal of the time. If you ask me fresh off a viewing of the Lord of the Rings, which I am, this is very cool. Of course, Amish horse related activities probably lean more towards 'driving a buggy along a highway to town' rather than 'tearing ass through a sparsely wooded area to escape Ringwraiths.'

So the horse aspect is a mixed bag- which brings us to the reasons why I could never last as an Amish. For one, I enjoy using zippers, and have nothing against them. They've been, for the most part, quite faithful for holding my snow pants, jackets and head wounds closed. (Ha, ha. Also: Eew.) All this zipper-love despite the fact that until about three months ago, I didn't even know how a zipper worked. Seriously, you ever try to zip a broken zipper? I was convinced there was some sort of sorcery at work in that little metal slide. Maybe that's why the Amish don't like them. Someone should tell them that they're not of the devil, they're of simple machines. They'd be all over them, I'd imagine.

Another problem I foresee is the bonnet. I'm not really a bonnet kind of girl. I don't think. I mean, I look ridiculous in a baseball cap, I can't see headwear that enfolds my melon into a covered wagon being an improvement. Let’s not even get into the hat hair issues. I think I read somewhere that the Amish have actually developed a genetically lessened hat hair response through natural selection. Well, either I read it in a scientific journal, or I made it up just now. Either way, I am passing this knowledge on to you. Do with it what you will.

Of course, one of the major reasons I can't be converting anytime soon is the electricity. I fully admit it, I love it and the gadgets that slurp it down. I want to be like that woman in the jewelry commercial, but with electricity: snuggled up to its chest, I'd murmur, "I love this utility! I love it, I love it, I love it." Sweet, sweet gadgets: the more specialized and obscure, the greater my desire to possess them. The Sharper Image is one of my meccas. Incidentally, I think my altitude is directly proportional to my gadgetphilia, and the airlines are fully aware of this. I confess to lusting after several objects in the Sky Mall catalogue on a recent plane trip. Coffee mug with a battery powered stirrer in the bottom? Electronic key locator? I'm looking at you guys.

A close cousin to this lack of electricity would be the dark. No, more than a cousin. More like that annoying neighbor kid who's always at your house, even though you told him to leave God knows how many times, his mother obviously needs to keep a better eye on him, and he can't take a hint to save his. Ahem. And for the purposes of this analogy, by 'kid' I mean 'marrow-craving undead humanoid monster.' Because if there's something worse than total darkness, it's darkness lit only by a quavering candle flame. I'm sure my bonnet and butter churn would take on creepy nocturnal lives of their own when lit only by a (no doubt hand-dipped) candle.

Without my various electric devices whirring and glowing, it'd be infinitely easier to visualize a slavering hell-beast hunkered down beneath my bed. And with naught but a candle lighting my way, the dancing light would surely find something that looked like red-rimmed, carnivorously evil eyes watching my every move. Of course, as an Amish, it's very likely I would not have watched as many movies as I have, and therefore would have a greatly diminished mental store of such images. Unless the Amish are allowed to have illustrated Bibles, their monster experience is probably limited to imagining satyrs, unicorns and the occasional dragon. Dragons, I'll give you that one. But satyrs? Half goat- so they can climb reasonably well in rocky terrain and probably have a propensity for eating tin cans. Yikes. And unicorns aren't nightmare inducing! They dance with rainbows and sleep on clouds! Psht. Nice try, Bible.

I might be scared of a unicorn at night, though. Case in point: I know I've mentioned the llamas that live near me. Well, these llamas cohabitate with a goat and a pony. Yes, it's like an admittedly lame but rather cute and fenced-in barnyard safari. Anyway, driving home from my sister's graduation, the car full of us was silent as we passed the llama-stead. The headlights suddenly illuminated the lone pony. His eyes flashed behind his ashen forelock before he dissolved into darkness as the road veered away from his paddock. In the creepiest whisper I could muster, I breathed, "night pony." Silence. A tense silence. "Wait. Did you just say 'night pony?'" Someone asked. Cue laughter. That comment ruined the mood. Nevertheless, I distinctly felt at the least a little weirded out and at most a lot weirded out by that night pony.

I think a night satyr or a night unicorn would have much the same effect, with a dash of 'the hell?' to taste. I urge you to try the night-object game - it's surprisingly creepy. Don't go for the obvious and clichéd 'night stalker' or 'night light'. Flex your creativity. 'Night pants' and 'night Elvis' are ready and waiting to freak you out.

So for now, I think I'll stick on the non-Amish side of this fence. Or barn. Whatever. I think if I had been born Amish, I'd be a rather confused individual, with an inexplicable yearning for complex arrangements of simple machines and a bad case of bonnet hair. I'd have saddle sores, really toned arms and about the same amount of fashion sense as I do now. Is there even an Amish conversion program available? I mean, outside of that Tim Allen and Kirstie Alley movie? So far, I’ve done okay without a plethora of barns or a orange slow-moving vehicle triangle braided into the tail of my primary transportation. And based on that no electricity experience, and maybe the trailer from that awful-looking movie, I'm gonna have to pass. Thanks, Amish, but I’ll stick with watching and wondering from afar. With my electronic infra-red binoculars. Which, let's face it, I’ll be ordering shortly, probably from a car on a cell phone.

I love you, electricity. Let's never fight again.