A delightful post. You write extremely well. I was born in Pennsylvania - not in Amish country, but they have always fascinated me. They keep, mostly, to themselves but harm no one. Amish is, in the US, a well-known synonym for "well made" Did you know they are often called the Pennsylvania Dutch? They aren't Dutch at all, but Rhineland Germans and the English colonists did not understand their response of "Deutsch" when asked what they were.