On a late-afternoon beer run with my brother-in-law in central Indiana, I spotted them as we crested a narrow, blacktop county road: a young Amish family, working in a cucumber field.
With the low sun lighting them from behind, the father, mother and four children seemed like ghosts from another century in their straw hats, prayer caps, barn-door pants and suspenders, long cotton dresses and aprons. All but the dad were barefoot.
It is one thing to contemplate the Amish through the 1985 Harrison Ford film, "Witness." It is another to dwell in an ever-busy, ever-beeping metropolis like the Bay Area and think of thousands of Amish living almost exactly as their ancestors did 300 years ago.
Deeply pacifist, humble and fundamentalist Christian, the Amish were born in Germany in 1693 of a schism in the Mennonite Church. In the early- and mid- 1800s, they left Switzerland and northern France (and Napoleon's military conscription) for religious freedom in the New World. About 150,000 now live in 22 states and Canada. The biggest settlement of Old Order Amish is in Lancaster County, Pa.; north-central Indiana has the next-largest number, about 20,000.
Ironically, the more tenaciously the Amish hold to demut (a life of simplicity and humility), the more fascinating they are to those of us whose clocks are stuck on fast-forward and who see our souls, relationships and planet being eaten by pagers, cell phones, e-mail, DSL, DVD, BART delays, road rage, air rage and an apparent march back to a 60-hour workweek.
Each year, 4 million people come to Lancaster County to soak up the trappings of the Amish lifestyle. In Parke County, Ind., where I sighed at the timeless calm of the family in the cucumber field, some 30 Amish clans have taken their reluctant place on the list of tourist attractions, not far behind the county's 32 beloved covered bridges.
"More and more of the people who visit Parke County want to see the Amish farms and buy their products," said Anne Lynk, the director of the county's convention and visitors' bureau.
But demand outweighs supply. While Amish adults and kids appear in public -- to sell vegetables, flowers, quilts, organic meats and cheeses, baked goods, lumber and horse tack -- they aren't inclined to pose for photos or talk about the way they live.
Said Lynk: "Several of them who do construction have contracted with the county to repair the roof on our West Union covered bridge. I would absolutely love to have a a picture of an Amish family going through a covered bridge on the front of my new brochure, but I know that's not going to happen. They want (a business relationship), but they want it on their own terms."
Those terms are perhaps best explained in a Bible passage, Romans 12:2: "And be not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God."
On a practical level, this means horses and buggies, not cars, trucks or tractors. It means candles and lanterns, not lines to power poles. It means no private telephones, only collective outdoor "phone shanties" for emergencies and business, period.
Not conforming to this world also means education in Amish-only schools and not past the elementary level. It means no intermarriage, no divorce and no birth control; Amish families average seven to eight children.
Rather than joyless deprivation, however, every aspect of this lifestyle is designed to promote Gelassenheit -- submission to God's, not the individual's, will -- and to strengthen the bonds of community. Remember community? Those of us who roam far in cars and planes talk a great game of it. So do we who rarely take the trouble to communicate face-to-face when a phone or e-mail is so much faster.
In truth, and despite our fantasies of a simpler life, most of us likely would last a week in an Amish lifestyle. No TV? No Internet? No stereos, movies, Social Security, Bud-Lite, Burger King, talk shows or Visa? The treasure of our personal freedom totally subjugated for the greater good?
Still, when people like me do encounter the genuine item -- fellow citizens living a decidedly un-2001 existence -- it's hard not to pause, look at our own insane, antiseptic pace and wonder "Why?"