An Amish Winter Trip Gone Wrong (Part 7): Small Mercies
Author Haley Straw returns today with part 7 (of 8 parts) of a new winter-themed series, drawing on one of her more challenging experiences as an Amish taxi driver. Part 1 is here, part 2 here, part 3 here, part 4 here, and part 5 here, and part 6 here if you missed them.
Everyone’s hard work and patience paid off. The families were safe and warm in their relatives’ homes, children unbundled and carried in, doors shut tight against the wind. Allen and I had done what we set out to do. That part mattered most.
Now we had to get ourselves home for Christmas.
It sounded simple enough.
We had made it in, so surely, we could make it out. All we had to do was get back through the snowdrifts, reach the main highway, and head south. In my tired mind, I pictured smooth sailing.
When you’re that exhausted, even the impossible starts to look reasonable.
Joni and Albert kindly offered to hitch up a relative’s buggy and pull our trailer through the drifts to the main road. It was a generous offer, especially after the long night we had all endured. We accepted.
The men climbed into our warm van, and for a few minutes, it felt almost normal. They joked. We laughed. The worst seemed behind us.
We didn’t make it far.
The wind had already undone the path we had forged. A snowdrift rose ahead of us like a wall. Allen did what he always does in moments like that — inch forward, rock back, build momentum. It worked, not the way we’d hoped though. It got us stuck in a deep ditch.
The van tilted sharply. I had to brace myself with my legs just to stay upright on my seat. Outside, the temperature hovered around five below zero, and the wind made it feel crueler.
Without hesitation, Joni and Albert secured a horse and buggy and headed out in the dark to find help. Like firemen running toward smoke, they went house to house looking for a farmer with a tractor.
While they were gone, Allen stepped out into the cold wearing cloth tennis shoes, one pair of socks, and more layers than I could count. He dug frantically for ten minutes before the cold won. His shoes were soaked through. His toes became numb. Back inside, he peeled off his socks and held his feet against the heating vents, waiting for feeling to return.
Dim lights eventually pushed through the blowing snow. Hope rose in my chest.
But Joni and Albert returned with disappointing news. It was too early. The farmers were asleep, and waking them didn’t sit right with Joni and Albert.
They weren’t done helping us, though. They offered to move our trailer closer to the van and suggested asking a neighbor with a skid loader once the sun rose. Maybe by then the snowplows would be out.
Allen pulled on my oversized fuzzy boots — his shoes were useless by then — and went back out to confer with the men.
I tried to lighten the moment when he climbed back in.
“Did the Amish notice you were wearing women’s boots?”
“They didn’t,” he said. “And even if they did, I don’t care.”
We were exhausted. We had been awake nearly twenty-six hours and on the road for most of them. With nothing else to do, we settled in as best we could and tried to sleep in that tilted van.
Rest didn’t come easily. Every light in the distance caught our attention. Every sound felt like either rescue or trouble.
Finally, one set of headlights turned into something more. A farmer had spotted us in the ditch — his ditch, as it turned out — and came to investigate. He first tried pulling us out with his one-ton pickup, then decided to fetch his skid loader.
He came prepared with two brand-new straps.
The first strap snapped with a loud crack as the van lifted and dropped. The second one broke as well. But he didn’t leave. He repositioned, adjusted, and worked until the van sat back on the gravel road.
Then he plowed a path ahead of us, clearing nearly three hundred feet to the top of the hill.
Allen offered him money for his time and the broken straps. The farmer refused.
In Amish communities, help is expected among neighbors. But this farmer did not owe us anything. He helped because we were there and needed it.
That is how rural life often works.
With the trailer reattached where the Amish had left it at the end of the road, we finally pulled forward. Twenty-two hours after starting what should have been an eight-hour trip, the families were delivered.
We were grateful. We were drained. And we were far from finished.
The storm had not passed. The roads were still dangerous. The wind was still biting. We had no one ahead of us now, no destination waiting with porch lights on.
The farmer had pulled us out of the ditch.
But we still had to find our own way home.
And the trailer we had left behind earlier in the storm was still sitting miles back on the roadside.
We would have to go back for it.
Haley Straw is a barefoot Amish taxi driver with a storyteller’s heart and a knack for gathering the kinds of tales the Amish share on long, quiet night drives. She tells these stories the way she experienced them —with raw honesty, a healthy dose of fear, and the hard-won wisdom that comes from surviving the storm. This winter series is drawn from her book Amish Christmas Mishaps. You can find her books, free Amish-inspired goodies, and more at haleystraw.com.
