KRISTOR WRITES:

This thread reminded me of an experience I had in Gambier, Ohio, where my eldest son went to Kenyon College. Gambier is out in the middle of nowhere, a tiny village at the top of a wooded hill surrounded by verdant and beautiful farms rolling away for many miles on every side. The town is so small that the tiny campus of Kenyon surrounds it. If you ever have a chance to visit the place, I highly recommend it; driving up into the hills is like driving into another and better world, more beautiful and merciful, and somehow true. We were back there a lot for parent weekends and that sort of thing, and I love the place. The campus is all Gothic; the town is traditional American Middle West.  

On those parent weekends, the local Amish families would set up booths in the middle of the boulevard that is one of the two main streets of the town, under the maples, to sell their handicrafts: brilliant quilts, immaculate baskets, jams, woolen blankets, and the like. They would park their buggies along the side of the road, and their barefoot, well-behaved children would play in the grass. The parents from San Francisco, Boston, Chicago, and Atlanta would walk up and down in their chinos or skirts and polo shirts, generally prepped to the max, and so in their way representative of another traditional American culture. And, of course, the college kids were dressed in the characteristic folk costumes of their own traditional American culture. The boys were unremarkable: jeans, t-shirts and sneakers, or else chinos, untucked polos, and deck shoes (that would be the collegiate culture of the South). The girls wore halter tops and tight cut-off jeans, and flip flops. They were about as dressed as they would have been in the bikinis of the 60s, as if they had all just got back from a swim at the quarry. 

Many of them were quite pretty, naturally enough, but the only girl on the street who was ever truly striking or memorable, on any of those visits, was Amish. It wasn’t that her face or body were more beautiful than those of the other girls. It was her attire, and the bearing that it made possible. She was walking along barefoot in her plain and simple dress, an apron, and wearing a bonnet. Only her lower legs, lower arms, and face were bare. She looked utterly comfortable and practical in the heat of Indian summer, loosely appareled, gracious, and at ease. The college girls were all cinched up in their denim girdles and elastic tops. They all had to keep pulling and tugging at their clothes to keep them in place and try to prevent an unwonted bulge. They were uncomfortable, and looked it; they were vulnerable, and a bit scared under their bravada. The Amish girl was more feminine, more attractive and beautiful, than any 10 of the other girls put together. The college boys chattered gaily with the college girls, but their eyes followed the quiet, demure Amish girl as she sashayed along, an island of serenity and dignity. 

She was to the rest of Gambier as Gambier is to the rest of America.

Laura writes:

Ironically, that beautiful Amish girl probably never needed to attract a mate purely through her looks. She probably already has a husband. I’m sure she chose a man from among the boys she had known for much of her life. She never found herself in a bar among complete strangers trying to decipher the gestures and looks of men she had never seen before in the hopes of finding one. The girls at Kenyon are part of community too. Some obviously choose from among the men they meet there. But many end up in big cities long before they’ve settled on a mate and a significant minority will have no children, never marry or have multiple marriages.

So when you talk about the Amish girl walking down the road, I think of a girl who is perhaps enjoying her final days of childhood before marrying and having six children, less hounded by the uncertainties of her future as the college girls will be. She knows what is in store for her. Her life won’t be idyllic, but she will never feel the need to construct a whole new identity. She will not be reinventing the wheel.

Perhaps it wasn’t just her clothes.

 Her entire being may have radiated the confidence bestowed on her by tradition and the promise of this relatively secure future.

                 — Comments —

Karen I. writes:

I think some married women appear more confident and beautiful as well. Even women from difficult or less traditional backgrounds sometimes blossom with the security of a good, traditional marriage. All hope is not lost for the immodest young girls, and we ought to pray for them. They most likely have had poor examples throughout their lives and truly do not know better. The Amish girl had good examples from day one. 

Parents can also start with their girls when they are young, by choosing pretty, modest clothing for them to wear. A girl who is not wearing pretty, modest things at seven is not going to start at seventeen. I am tired of people saying you can’t find anything decent for a girl that does not cost a fortune. I just got my daughter a dress from Land’s End for $19 with free shipping. It is made of a knit fabric with butterflies on it, and has a full gathered skirt, modest neckline, and sleeves. It comes in about 8 fabric choices and these dresses wear like iron. They can even be worn with leggings or shorts underneath for more modesty. You do not have to be rich or Amish to protect your daughter’s dignity, but you do have to care and you have to start young for them to care.

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