My understanding of friendship continues to grow.

I went to the Miller Farm this afternoon to pick up Eli, his wife and three children, and Moise’s stepmother and take them to the bus station in Glens Falls.

I also wanted to congratulate Moise on the completion (mostly) of his barn.

The rain was torrential and my car was stuffed with kids and people and baggage.

Moise was happier than I have ever seen him.

As I pulled in, he rushed out to shake my hand and high-fived me. “Johnie did it,” he said simply.  He couldn’t stop looking over at his new barn.

“Tonight we’ll finish building the horse stables in the barn.  Tomorrow, that’ where the horses will sleep.”

And then, taking my arm, he said “are you around early next week? I want to order concrete for our house, and some other people’s houses.”

I couldn’t help laughing. “So this is your idea of resting, eh?”

Let’s do it again, I thought to myself.

He smiled. “I did rest, I slept last night.” Who was I kidding? I never thought for one second he could take a day off except to pray.

I felt like Butch Cassiday and the Sundance Kid heading out on the road. He never heard of them. At the other end will be a house.

The barn is beautifully seen from the south side.

I didn’t really know how ambitious and lovely the barn would look, or how much of Moise’s personal design went into it. Eli says most Amish barns don’t look like that.

I underestimated its very regal and dramatic presence. As Eli told me in the car, Moise was shooting high.

Moise and Eli  – the Amish project foreman – were both surprised by how many people came by and wished them well. Me too. We counted between 60 and 70.

I’m excited about Moise and me resuming our wild rides in the country.

And I love watching Moise negotiate and calculate. It is an art for all of its own.

I guess the new house is next in line, although the interior of the stall still needs some work.

Soon, he’s going to want sheep in there – I thought we had a deal for some Vermont sheep but that fell through – and some goats. The cows will move in soon after the sheep, and then the goats.

It’s an interesting thing about the Amish. They never praise themselves and they don’t much praise other people. They bank on trust and humility.

They accept life at its face value.

On the way home, Eli turned to me in the car, and he said, “you know how much they appreciate you, don’t you?” I was somewhat surprised. “I really haven’t done that much for them,” I said.

“But you have,” said Eli, “for one thing, nobody was available to take us to the bus station in this rain.” It was nothing much, I said, I told Eli I admired him and enjoyed talking to him. We had become friends too.

I like to think I don’t need recognition, but of course, everybody does. I was pleased.

They are teaching me a lot about friendship, challenging lessons I need to learn.

I am learning that one way to help the Amish is not to help them too much.

It makes them nervous, and uncomfortable. They hate to say no, they think it’s rude. But in their home, I never see one thing they don’t absolutely need. And they can afford to buy what they need.

If they won’t accept social security or pandemic checks from the government, why would they be wanting help from me?

They don’t want a lot of stuff,  that’s one of the best ways to help them – to not buy them stuff.  To just be nice to them and their children and buy some donuts and vegetables once in a while.

And give them a ride when they need it.

That’s what they need.

Because the girls go barefoot and they don’t drive cars or wear contemporary clothes or use make-up or jewelry, or go to doctors much, people tend to assume they have no money and bring them things they think they need.

I thought so before I got to know them.

But one of the things they most need is to not have a lot of things they don’t need and don’t want, as the English learn to do from birth.

That is what being plan and simple means.

It’s a very un-American idea, hard for people to swallow, But it is at the heart of being Amish.

I noticed after a while that some of the things I brought them simply disappeared.

I never saw them again.

I’ve been there when people bring them furniture, bags of food as if they didn’t have enough to eat, donations of money. The Amish eat like horses, three rich and hearty meals a day. They have plenty to eat.

There are acres of good food right out the door.

In the outside world, we often measure ourselves by what we have, how many things, the latest this or that, how much money we have, what our clothes look like.

Even we call it the rat race, how must it look to them?

In the Amish world, life is measured in exactly the opposite way – by how much they can do without.

They seek the plain and simple life, while we rush headlong into the complicated and complex life. I’m not sure who feels sorrier for who.

Respecting that is important, perhaps defining, that’s the lesson in my friendship.

When I can help, I will.  I see some chances and take my shots. (the basket project was wanted and needed, and paid for.) More and more, I pass on them. That is not what friendship is about.

When they need help, they ask.

When they don’t need help, I don’t help.

It is a myth that the Amish are poor. I see that they are far wealthier than many of the people who want to give them things.

They are wealthier than me, and they don’t give me things, at least not things that are material.

They don’t measure poverty in the way we English do.

They measure poverty by the loss of family, the loss of community, the loss of faith, the loss of work, the violence in the world.

I’m sure they think I am quite poor in many ways. But Moise doesn’t judge other people and most of us do.

Moise loves his barn, but more than that, he loves the people who came to help him build it.

He appreciates being driven around to lay the foundation for his home. And he appreciates having someone from the outside to talk to when he feels like it.

In a way, he is as curious about me as I am about him.

He can talk about soil and lumber and farming with a lot of people, but we are each a connection to the others world.

That’s our gift to each other, we fill in the dots.

Giving him something he really needs is driving him so that he doesn’t have to worry about how he will get to where he needs to go and spend hours traveling rather than accomplishing things.

In time, he will create his own transportation network. It’s what they do.

Moise figured out that I wrote all morning, and that I sometimes have time in the afternoon. He never asks me to drive him somewhere in the morning.

I don’t need to hang out with him in bars or at football games. I like the trust and purity in our friendship.

It is a gift to me. It is plain and simple in a way. That works for me.

For much of my life, I have been a giver. I like to give things to people, it was a way of feeling safer, needed, and liked. Sometimes – as with the refugees and the residents at the Mansion – that kind of help is urgently needed and appropriate.

They both need stuff.  But the Amish don’t need shoes and underwear and sweaters, or laptops for school.

I think one of the reasons for my friendship with Moise is that the things I give him are few and small, and never material.

One is simply showing up and encouraging his work on the farm and his new life.

Moise is strong and tough, but he is not a superhero. Sometimes he just needs to act normal, like everybody else.

Since the Amish are not like anybody else, that can be tricky.

I’m quite sure he knows by now that I write kindly things about him and the family on the blog, which a lot of people read. Many people have told me that they tell him that.

He and I will never discuss it, no matter how long our friendship lasts.

I will never tell him and he will never ask me about it or thank me. Because that really isn’t anything he needs or cares about.

It’s something I care about.

Driving him around upstate for a few hours once in a while so he can haggle with the people who can make his home and life possible is something that he does need and does want. And I love listening to it.

The man is a brilliant bargainer.

Eli told me how much it means to him.

Generosity, I’ve learned, is not about what I want to give, but about understanding what people want and need to get. In a sense, that is also what empathy is about.

There is a big difference between the two, and the friendship with the Amish is helping me learn that.

Sue Silverstein, who has devoted her life as a teacher to the poor and vulnerable, has also taught me what it means to give. She just shows up. She has little money and less time, but she always shows up when she needs to show up.

Showing up is everything.

I think I’m learning to do that with Moise and his family. I show up. I appreciate their trust in me, and I can feel his gratitude without words. It’s more than fair, more than equal.

I can see the love and connection as the Amish workers say goodbye and go back to their lives. They show up, always. Nobody brings anything, nobody takes anything home but themselves.

Riding to the bus station, Eli talked to me about how much he missed the six children waiting for him at home (three were in the car, they never spoke the whole way to Glens Falls). He can’t wait to go oversee the next barn.

“Just think,” he said quietly, beaming, “Moise has his barn.”

When we got there we shook hands,  he tried once more to pay me. “Why don’t I at least pay you for the gas?” he said.

“I don’t do this for the money, “I said, “and my hybrid Toyota doesn’t use much gas.  I do it for the friendship, for your generosity in educating me in building a barn, for the good talk we had on the way. I can’t put a price tag on that.”

Come back soon, I said. We have lots more to say to each other.