Next week we are going to see Weird Al Yankovic in concert. The closer we get to the date, the more I find myself singing "Amish Paradise" and wondering if he'll perform it here, in North Amishlandia.
Today I went to a grocery store near an Amish community. To give you an idea of what this means, the store has Amish parking. It's an open-sided shed where they can park their buggies and have shade for the horses. Apparently Friday is also Amish market day, from the numbers of them in the store and on the roads nearby. As I was leaving, and repeatedly passing these buggies, I came upon one that made me hang back a minute just to look at it.
This was a blinged-out buggy. It had a chrome-trimmed mudflap on the back, chrome studs along the cab seams, and chrome hubs on the traditional spoked wheels. When I finally passed, I was fully expecting to see a spiked biker helmet on the horse but alas, the horse had (thus far) escaped decoration. I believe this was the young Amish couple I'd seen leaving the store with a case of Orange Crush. You go, you rebels.
Speaking of, last summer we hired a couple of very nice, proper young Amish ladies. Although I live near N. Amishlandia, I haven't had much opportunity to talk to the Amish and learn more about their lifestyles. They stay rather private among us "English" anyway. However these two ladies gave me a lesson and a few laughs.
They don't use zippers or snaps, so every morning they pinned their clothes and came to work in full standard Amish uniform: jacket, long dress, underskirt, long sleeves, apron, hat, hair pulled up, black shoes. I'd have had to get up 2 hours early just to dress myself for work - I can pull on shorts and a t-shirt and (most of the time) remember to wear a bra and be out the door in 5 minutes - but I imagine these girls have done it so often it's routine. Anyway by noon they had usually shed their jackets and pinned up their overskirts due to the high temperatures in the greenhouse but this was the most "alteration" I had seen. Until one day I saw the two ladies walking down towards me and both were wearing black sunglasses with rhinestones on the sides. I commented "Nice shades! Strike a pose!" and rather than give me the Vogue fashion model look I expected, they both stopped, put their backs together, and crossed their arms in a "'Yeah we bad" thug pose. Imagine these two very proper Amish girls in full dress with their blinged-out Ray-Bans and add the pose and it was just... I lost it. I still laugh thinking about it.
One of the ladies, Sara, was a schoolteacher. She spoke in textbook English with perfect, though slightly accented, enunciation. One morning I gave her the wrong instruction, and immediately corrected myself with the added comment "Sorry, didn't have my coffee today, my brain isn't awake yet."
Sara replied "Oh my, I cannot get going without my coffee!"
At some prior point in my life I confused Amish with Muslims, apparently. I said "I didn't know you were allowed to have caffeine!"
Sara: "Oh yes, we can. Coffee and tea and even colas. I have to have a cup of coffee every morning. But I do not like those energy drinks."
Me: *raises eyebrow*
Sara: "I had a Red Bull one time and I felt so hyped up! It was crazy! I couldn't calm down at all."
Me: "Now I know how you all build barns so fast."
Red Bull: It even gives the Amish wings.
I was in Wal-Mart one day and passed by the video arcade on the way out. There were two older bearded Amish men in full dress playing Big Game Hunter, the one with the plastic guns you shoot at the screen. I wish I could have gotten a picture of that, or of any of the things mentioned above, but due to their beliefs photos aren't allowed. So you'll just have to imagine it and by the way, welcome to 1992, Amish folk! You're catching up!
Amish-made wet-bottom shoofly pies rock. That is all.
2 comments:
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