Non-Amish Non-Hospitality

Saturday evening I was invited to a banquet at a local "Amish" family restaurant. I really wonder what a real Amish would have thought.

The banquet was a fundraiser on behalf of a Christian ministry, and they did a good job of their part. I even pledged to send some money. But this isn't about them. It's about the restaurant.

I feel pretty certain that any Amish would be uncomfortable with all the made-in-China gewgaws for sale in the upstairs souvenir shop. Halloween junk. Christmas junk. Just plain junk. The only thing I saw up there that reminded me of the Plain People was an assortment of quilts.

Downstairs, we had a banquet room reserved, with long tables for all of us potential missionary supporters. Maybe there was a problem with last-minute invitations, because we were really jammed in there. The teenage boy to my left kept putting his elbow in my face as he ate. There was just enough room in front of each of us for a plate (with a salad plate on top of it) and flatware. So when the real food began to arrive (and the people bussing the tables hadn't), we sort of pushed things aside and piled the salad plates on top of each other.

The main dishes were served family-style (sort of a trademark of Amish-style restaurants). Serving dishes with large spoons in them were passed down the tables. Now I know it's nobody's fault that I'm under 5'6" and it's probably nobody's real fault that the chairs were unusually low for a table, but it took a little bit of readjustment (and a spilled glass of water) before I understood that I had to actually hoist the serving dish above shoulder-height to pass it on. The hoisting part wasn't that difficult, though. By the time the dishes got to me in the middle of the table, they were empty.

This is the point for a digression. I've only met a few Amish, but they were uniformly gracious and pleasant. I strongly suspect that an empty serving dish would be counted as a disaster. Yes, the restaurant did end up bringing out more food, but not before several of us had volunteered to go hungry so the people further down the line could have something to eat.

And now it's time for another digression. I live in Ohio, widely considered to be the heart of the midwest. Fruitful fields and happy farm wives and all that. Well, maybe it's so, but the most vivid personality characteristic I have noticed since moving here in the 1970s is a total lack of hospitality. Church potlucks have been discontinued because there is rarely enough food: most folks show up looking for a free meal, so those in charge of things have to provide a really large amount. Nobody knows how to be a host, and nobody knows how to be a guest. In over 30 years of church membership, I've only been a guest at half a dozen people's houses. And to be fair, I've only reciprocated about the same number of times.

End of digression. The family restaurant just felt too much like the church potluck. Maybe I'm traveling with the wrong crowd. I visited an Episcopalian church last winter and happened to show up on the day of a church dinner. There was food and friendship to spare.

More church stuff

Had a sit-down with the pastor on Tuesday. It was kind of weird—when he left an answering machine message for me, he actually sounded a bit frightened.

I'm tempted to give one of those reports that diplomats give when they come out of a summit meeting: "It was a productive conversation and both sides got a chance to air their views." Well yeah, but it was more than that. I think Jerry and I actually began a friendship once again.

One really important thing was the discussion of public role versus private friendship. Apparently Jerry (the pastor) often feels that he's got to preserve some sort of persona and to make all sorts of people happy. Thus, he's the fireman and zooming around trying to put out fires. Or maybe policeman is a better analogy. I know that police officers are often compassionate, caring individuals, but when they appear at the door in response to a neighbor's call, they always have a gun. Jerry (and his messenger, Greg) often appears to have a gun. Or at least an agenda that says, "I'm right. You're wrong. Listen now." So we talked about that. He asked whether I could be friends with Greg if Greg were to stop being a church officer. The answer was "Of course!" I actually like Greg when he's not telling me that I've screwed up again.

So we're trying to navigate this territory—trying to forget (for a moment, anyhow) that we have an official relationship with each other. Hope it works.