Stuck as a Slabaugh
This story stemmed out of an assignment to write a story with the phrase, “I crested a hill and saw a light in the distance.” The teacher had referenced Amish novels in some examples and this is what I came up with. The story is totally written by me but the image is AI. Ironically, I have never read an Amish novel before.
Jacob Slabaugh and I had wanted to get married and leave to go to a church with a more liberal ordnung for a while but the bishop didn’t like it. Begrudgingly, we didn’t marry and pretended to quit courting each other but we still met in secret. I worked at Yoder’s Baked Goods and he worked across the road at Miller’s Buggy Shop. There was seldom a lunch where we didn’t sneak into a spare buggy on the lot to eat together.
Early on when the bishop had told us he didn’t like our courtship we had decided to leave the church and move away from Pennsylvania. We had tried to scheme many times but hadn’t figured out a way that would be feasible. One day while eating in a spare buggy Jacob spoke up. “Why couldn’t we just hook up a buggy and escape?” he asked. It was brilliant. We had never thought of it although we had eaten in the buggy many times. We decided to escape the next night after sunset.
After gathering supplies for the escape, we met at Miller’s since it was central to both our homes. Jacob had brought one of his family’s horses and he hooked up the buggy while I quickly packed our things, glancing over my shoulder to make sure no one was watching. We had both tried to sneak out as quietly as possible and had skipped supper to pack. I pulled out the shoofly pie I had made so we could eat on the run, or trot as the horse was doing. We had barely pulled out of the buggy shop when we saw a family on scooters on their way to some family gathering or something. When we got closer we realised it was Jacob’s family! While he put on a different hat and shirt, I quickly changed my covering to that of a different church group so they wouldn’t be suspicious. As soon as we passed them we both breathed a sigh of relief. However, that wasn’t our only close call. It seemed as though our whole church had decided to go out for a scoot. We saw everyone from the bishop and his family to my first grade teacher. Since donning the disguises nothing had gone wrong. We had passed multiple families with none of them giving a second thought. Everything was just fine and we were letting our guard down when we turned a corner and ran into my best friend Martha. When I say ran into, I mean it. She was on her scooter and wasn’t paying attention and she had sideswiped our buggy. We quickly stopped the buggy and got out hoping she wouldn’t recognize us. There was a first aid kit in the buggy and we quickly bandaged her up and helped her to the nearest neighbors. After we told them what had happened, we told them we were on our way somewhere and left as quickly as possible.
By the time all this had transpired it was dark and we had been riding for quite some time. Soon Jacob and I crested a hill and saw a light in the distance. We went towards the light as quickly as the horse could trot. We soon discovered it was a church across the Maryland border. We had done it! We had escaped the confines of our old ordnung so we could now be married.
We soon became members at the church and got married. Jacob and I enjoyed the quiet life we now lived. When I was little I never wanted to stay a Slabaugh, my maiden name. Although it was painful leaving our family and friends, we knew it was worth it and I never regretted my decision to be stuck as a Slabaugh.
