Miriam's Bliss

By Gloria Gavin

Miriam cannot wait for the next Amish social but some of the elders are thinking about the prospect of cancelling the event. Crestfallen, Miriam feels like the opportunity to meet some nice Amish young men is gone...But when her long-time friend Eli helps her to try and salvage the event...something strange happens...she begins to see qualities in him that she had never seen before.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trellis Publishing
• Release date: Jul 9, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201481384

Book preview

MIRIAM’S BLISS

GLORIA GAVIN

table of contents

MIRIAM’S BLISS

THE BEAUTIFUL CHOICE

THE SHY AMISH BRIDE

JOANNA

ELAINE

AMISH INNOCENCE

AMISH GIRL IN THE BIG APPLE

Miriam Albrecht loves her life.

It is a life filled with promise. A life she always expected but is still surprised and delighted by.

Miriam remembers what it was like when she was a young girl.

She used to watch her parents toil and fuss all day and most of of the night. In her youth she was a bystander, a witness to the necessity of hard work and the dedication it took to survive amongst their fellow Amish.

She witnessed Mother arise at dawn each day, unsmiling but silent. Mother said quick morning prayers, changed out of her sleep clothes, washed her face with a flannel cloth and Uncle Zook’s oatmeal soap, and left the house to milk and feed the cows. When she was older, these chores would fall to Miriam to complete, but when she was a girl, all she needed do was watch, learn and be cherished by her parents.

Mother was a stern and unsmiling woman, ‘a woman of depth and magnitude’ according to Father.

Father was anything but. He was always smiling, always happy, full of grace and dignity. Beloved of his friends and neighbours, Jacob Albrecht was a man amongst men. If there was ever anything to be built or repaired or maintained in Blissfield Village, Father would always be amongst the first of men to help and make sure the job was done, and was done well.

The Albrechts had always been a pious family, ever since their people had settled in Holmes County back in the early eighteenth century.

They had fled Offenburg in the old country to avoid persecution by the others who did not share the same values and beliefs.

Initially they had moved to Pennsylvania after crossing an arduous ocean on mammoth vessels of wood and steel. The community decided to split and half moved further out into the southern reaches of Ohio.

Blissfield was all Miriam had ever known, perhaps all she would ever know. This pleased her.

Miriam Albrecht was sixteen, and she was happy to stay here for the rest of her life.

The outside world held no interest for her. Here amongst the Amish she was safe and she was loved. Out in the world beyond, past the tree line after Josef Miller’s farm, past the grazing field and the duck ponds, out there were the English.

Miriam had no desire or curiosity about the English, about how they live. She may have once, but if she did, that curiosity was forgotten. As insubstantial as a daydream.

Father used to take the cart and horse just past Warsaw Township once every three months to see his brother. Miriam and Mother never accompanied him out of fears for their safety. On one of those visits, Miriam had asked father if she might come along. She had it in her head that she needed to get away, if only for a few hours. She wanted to feel the gentle lull of the carriage beneath her, and had an unexpected longing to be somewhere, anywhere but here. Father seemed a little reticent at first, but soon decided it might be a good thing for his beloved daughter to enjoy the company of her cousins. After a brief argument with Mother, it was decided that Miriam could venture out into the world with Father that day.

Mother fussed over Miriam, making sure that she was properly dressed to combat the cold November grey. And put your bonnet on, daughter. Do not sit up on that carriage with the wind tearing at your bare head.

Miriam grabbed her bonnet, racing to catch up with Father.

Will do, Mother. See you later on.

Miriam had just turned thirteen, the time in a girl’s life where curiosity is key and imagination is limitless.

That was the day she first noticed Eli for the first time, really noticed him.

It was the day that everything changed forever.

Father had tried to nudge old Nellie along with a flick of the reins, but she wouldn’t move an inch. That’s thing with horses, when they’re young they’re impossible to keep still, as they get older they become impossible to move. Father tried to gently coax her along with soothing words.

‘There there, off you trot, Nellie girl. There there. Off you trot."

But still she would not trot.

Father was not an impatient man by any definition of the word, but wary of the time, and the fact that the day was slowly seeping away from them like the last of the corn to be milled, he jerked suddenly and violently on the reins. Nellie took off at quite a frenetic pace, utterly livid was she to be treated as such.

Miriam had not been expecting the sudden movement, and momentarily lost her grip on the bonnet, it flew from her hands and got swept into the draft behind the cab. Father pulled on the reins and stopped a now incensed Nellie.

Go get your bonnet, girl. You ought to have minded Mother.

Yes, Father. I’m sorry.

Miriam jumped down from the carriage and quickly walked back the way they’d just travelled. She turned her head to the right, and the left not seeing the bonnet. She looked at the next house on the right, just across from hers. It was where the Hiltys lived. Ruth Hilty was Miriam’s best friend in the whole world. She had been born two weeks before Miriam, but it had always felt like they were sisters. Ruth had an older brother, Eli who was a year and a half their senior.

The Hiltys also had an older girl by the name of Sadie. Sadie was five years older than Miriam and Ruth.

Sadie had embarked on a rather scandalous rumspringa when she was seventeen. Miriam wasn’t privy to the details, but Sadie had disappeared for two weeks, eventually returning tears eyed and dishevelled. Ruth said that her sister had met a boy, an English boy and he had broken her heart. Miriam hardly saw Sadie after that, and when she was eighteen, she had disappeared. The Hiltys never spoke of Sadie after that, but Ruth told Miriam Sadie had been living with the English boy in Columbus. She wrote of how happy she was in her unexpected life, but she still missed the simplicity of the Amish.

Miriam came out of her thoughts and saw her bonnet lying on the Hiltys’ front lawn. She breathed a sigh of relief. She swung the heavy wooden gate open, and looked appreciatively at the rose garden. Mother Hilty had always loved her roses, and tended them as if they were her own family.

As Miriam raced into the garden, she heard a low chuckle. She turned and saw Eli Hilty tilling soil just beyond the front porch of the house. He jabbed the pitchfork into the sand and took a cloth to mop his sweaty brow. Miriam picked up her bonnet, dusting it off, but was unable to take her eyes off Eli.

Eli was only wearing a shirt with rolled up sleeves and no coat.

The day was chilly, the kind of weather that reminds everyone who exactly is in control.

Miriam noticed that at fifteen, Eli was not the boy he had always been. He was tall, almost five ten, and he looked closer to manhood than he ought.

Your Nellie took off at quite a pace. Didn’t she Albrecht?

Oh, you saw that?

I should think the whole village saw that... He waved his left arm in a wide, sweeping arc.

His sandy brown hair blew in the breeze, his blue eyes twinkled, icy yet full of warmth.

Miriam blushed. You mind yourself, Eli Hilty. She tied the chin straps to secure the bonnet atop her head.

Eli moved closer to her. Just a moment.

He lifted his hand and tucked a stray lock of her long blonde hair into the bonnet. There you go, Albrecht. Now you’re perfect.

Miriam’s blush transformed from a pink to a crimson, like a summer’s sunset.

You off to your uncle’s?

Yes...how did?...

Ruth. God built my sister for keeping many things, but a secret was never one of them.

Miriam couldn’t help but smile. Yes. Quite so.

Miriam! Come now child.

Miriam turned and saw Father standing impatiently next to the carriage. She nodded and turned back to Eli.

I must be going. Goodbye Eli.

Eli smiled and turned back towards his task, softly whistling as he contemplated his day of work.

Miriam watched him walk away and then turned to run towards Father and the trip to Warsaw.

As she got up onto the carriage, Father gave her a wary look.

There is a reason Mother fusses the way she does. She knows how lackadaisical you can be. Next time, put your bonnet on when she tells you to.

‘Yes, Father. I’m sorry."

Father gave a sharp tug of the rein, and this time Nellie set off as requested with a whinny and no delay.

The sharp breeze encased the carriage, enveloping father and daughter in a cool cocoon. Miriam found the sensation not altogether unpleasant.

What did young Hilty have to say for himself? Father asked, with an inscrutable look on his face.

Not too much, Father. He just made a comment about Nellie taking off earlier.

That’s all?

Yes.

It seemed like it may have been a longer conversation.

No. Not at all Father.

Hmmm.

They didn’t speak again until they had gotten to the outskirts of Warsaw.

Miriam had enjoyed the afternoon with her cousins . She smiled and contributed as was expected, but could not stop thinking about Eli. She felt the gentleness of his fingertips as he brushed her hair under her bonnet. She saw his beautiful blue eyes and handsome smile every time she blinked. She excused herself and went to the bathroom. As she closed the door, she regarded herself in the mirror. Her long blonde hair, her pert nose with a smattering of feint freckles, her jade eyes. She had always thought of herself as a girl. It was plain to see that she was becoming a woman. Even so, Eli Hilty? She shook her head and laughed. Eli Hilty still thought of her as Ruth’s younger friend. He would never think of her in that way.

Miriam washed her hands, and resolved to enjoy the rare company of her cousins. She would think of Eli Hilty no more, that day.

She promised herself.

Alas it was a promise she broke more than once.

Now three years later, the impossible had happened. Eli had made his intentions known. He had asked Father for permission to take Miriam to her first social. Father agreed, on the condition that it was alright with his daughter.

Miriam felt her heart jump inside her chest when Eli asked her.

Albrecht, will you...

Yes! Yes, I will.

Eli laughed. You don’t even know what I was going to ask you.

Oh. Um.

Eli laughed even harder.

So you’ll do me the honor of going to the social with me?

Miriam smiled. Yes. I would like that very much.

Eli smiled and flushed with pleasure. I look forward to it, Albrecht.

With that, he took Miriam’s hand and brought it to his lips. She almost swooned.

Miriam Albrecht was going to her first social.

With a boy.

And that boy was Eli Hilty, the boy who had invaded her very dreams for what seemed like centuries. She was going with Eli to the social, and she had never felt as alive as she did that moment.

She felt as if everything was possible, no mountain was too high to climb.

Miriam felt as though she might just take on the world and win.

Of course, Eli had kept the news of his invitation to himself.

He had not even told Ruth, his very own sister.

After he had asked Miriam and she had accepted, Eli had not mentioned anything.

It was only after the cows had been milked the following morning and hot bread and fresh eggs were on the table that Eli let it out. Pa Hilty had just said Grace and passed the bread around. He handed the platter to Eli.

So, son, what news of the village?

Eli took the bread, and placed two steaming doorstop slices on his plate, passing it across to Ruth.

Thank you, Pa. Not much going on today. I told Old Ned Vanderwaal that I’d help replace the beams on his barn roof later on. I’ll have the soil beds ready for the next rose planting by tomorrow, Ma.

Ma Hilty was just about to put piping hot scrambled eggs into her mouth, she smiled and paused. The eggs shook slightly on the fork fluffy and yellow, eager to be eaten.

You are a good boy, my Eli. I only wish you spent more time on personal pursuits, Ma Hilty said,