I’m always amazed at the positive attitudes my Amish friends have when visiting with them. We were talking about the weather (The weather always comes up in conversations in Minnesota!) We have been experiencing the dog days of summer this past week and Mary was planning to can cherries and blueberry jam today. I asked if she had to use her wood buring stove in the kitchen to do the canning. Sometimes the Amish women have oil buring stoves in a summer kitchen so they don’t heat up the house. Mary said yes, she was using the stove in her kitchen and it was going to get hot, but she had done it before and survived the heat! How many people do you know that would have complained about the heat and wouldn’t bother to work in it and save the work for a cooler day? I’ve learned to be thankful for what I have and try not to complain too much. I have it a lot easier than many of the Amish who burn wood for cooking, put up with the heat without air conditioning, and ride in their warm buggies pulled by sweaty horses while fast-driving English (what the Amish call the non-Amish) pass them in their motor vehicles covering them with dust from the gravel roads.
