Junior Year Box Set

During the 16th century, those who founded our faith broke away from the state religion’s practice of baptizing infants. They reasoned that only adults could make the decision to follow Jesus Christ and volunteer to be baptized. So they ‘rebaptized’ as adults those whom the Church had already baptized as babies. Back then it was considered heresy to rebaptize. Anabaptists were persecuted and even killed for that belief.

Because of the persecution, many fled Europe for the freedom of the Americas. Given that experience, it was only natural for us to congregate within our own communities for protection. That might be where people get the idea we aren’t like others. It’s not so different from other groups of people that live in communities. I would bet people can point to Chinatown or Little Italy areas in their city.

With that being said about how we are open and enlightened, I grew up feeling isolated. I lived on a farm with my brother and parents. I’m sure many farm kids feel the same. For us, though, there was only one way in and out of the group of Mennonite farms, and that seemed to add to our isolation. As with many small farms, money was always in short supply. That meant there were no trips to town for trivial things like hanging out at the mall or going to the movies. We found ways to get by. Of course, we canned much of our food, made our clothes, and learned to create gifts with our hands.

There were other kids close to our age we spent time with. They seemed to be going as stir-crazy as I was when David showed up at our farm. Roc had played Little League with David and his friends. I remembered David from when he came to one of Roc’s birthday parties. It was a huge deal because my brother was able to invite his whole Little League team.

David came right up to me and introduced himself. We were in middle school, and most boys had decided girls were weird, or that was what Roc told me. I don’t remember what we talked about. I think he spoke, and I stared at him because I wasn’t sure what to make of him.

Then several years later he drives up to the farm in a flashy car with a gorgeous girl next to him, and I’m out washing the truck. When he stepped out of the car, I about died. Pudgy little David had transformed into something that made it hard to even look at him and breathe at the same time. I didn’t realize real boys looked like that. To my horror, I was in my grungy car-washing clothes.

He confused me so much I remember yelling at him. I know, right? How stupid could I be?

Then he talks to Roc about coming out for football. In a blur of pure genius, David saved us from homeschooling. I have to thank my mother because as soon as word got out, all the other kids wanted to go to regular school. She smoothed the waters because she recognized how much Roc really wanted to play football.

I never expected someone would talk to Tracy Dole about me. She came out to the farm and talked to my mom and me about me going out for cheerleading. She explained it would help me make friends and that they needed me. I’m not sure if that latter part was true or not, but it turned out to be a lot of fun.

◊◊◊

For me, going to public school was a godsend. My mom understood we needed to fit in, so that meant a shopping spree at Walmart, her go-to store for most everything. She convinced the other parents they needed to buy new school clothes. It wasn’t like we didn’t have work clothes for the farm. People considered us different enough that we didn’t need to show up looking like poor dirt-farmers.

I wasn’t nearly as embarrassed the next time I saw David. He’d come to Tracy’s house to join us swimming. He was talking to Brook Davis, and I felt a surge of jealousy. I don’t know what came over me, but the next thing I knew, I’ve walked up to him and kissed him the cheek. When he asked why I’d kissed him, I thought quickly and said it was for helping us get out of homeschooling. Brook was eyeing him, so I got brave and asked him if he would show me around school my first day.

When school started, I was surprised to find David in all my AP classes. I mean, I realized he wasn’t stupid, but I had no idea how smart he really was. Maybe because of how outgoing he was, I just never recognized it before.

I soon found out there was a whole different side to David, the side I fell in love with. He’d shown up on a Sunday afternoon. I had chores to do, and he pitched in and helped me, to my surprise. Once again, I’d completely misread him. His friend Wolf talked about doing yard work at David’s, and I’d heard that he had a cleaning lady. I simply assumed him to be what I would imagine a teenage boy with money would be like, afraid of work. I should have known better by what I’d heard of his workouts. David never hesitated to help me muck out stalls and feed the horses.