Thursday Kidron Auction

Started the day at the so called Amish Flea Market. This is the one between Walnut Creek and Sugar Creek, not the one between Walnut Creek and Berlin. For the record...I saw no Amish there, just a lot of merchandise hawkers. Even a salesman sitting at a table, trying to sell life insurance. Well he wasn't trying very hard, and he seemed more interested in his laptop than in anyone walking by. It cost $1 for parking... not sure if it was worth it.
We decided that if we saw anyone outside at Miller's when we drove by we would stop in. We drive that way nearly everyday but don't want to keep farmers from their chores. It was about 11:30 am and sure enough, Kathy was mowing and the girls were also working outside. Their oldest daughter Diane works in Mount Hope at an Amish fabric store. Second daughter Christa works at the Yoder Amish farm as a tour guide. Some days she takes Timothy to work, and he gets bigger tips that she does. Apparently he has followed her around enough that he has memorized the tour and can give it flawlessly himself. Because of his small size the gullible tourists are a pushover. I'm afraid I would leave completely broke myself because he is so much fun to listen to and he is adorable. We steered clear of Yoder's Amish farm, besides we can visit the Miller's for free. Willis and Kathy want us to come back for supper but I tell them to talk it over first and let us know, I give them our cell phone.
We went to the Kidron animal auction next being it's only about 8 miles from the Miller's farm. Kidron auction is every Thursday. Mount Hope has auction every Wednesday, I think Farmstead is on Tuesdays. We always try to get to at least one auction every time we get to Amland.
This Auction is in a very old auction house, and it's always a challenge to find the entrance because there is no "entrance". We went in a back door called city desk and up a back stairway. The sound and smell of animals was everywhere but that only adds to the thrill of the moment. Bette took my arm and whispered, that perhaps we came in the wrong place. The auction was well underway as we could hear a West Virginia drawl doing some rapid fire verbal calisthenics.
We walked on old worn wood barn floors past a counter lined with Amish farmers filling out paperwork for the dozen or so city desk women. I open the only door I saw at the back of the room and walked through, Bette and Josiah in tow. To our surprise we were entering front stage left right beside the auctioneer pen. The place was packed, and there was only a slight pause as all the Amish eyes locked onto us. We wanted to run, but that would only draw more attention to us. (That and the fact that Josiah could possibly slow down our escape.) So I decided to act like we entered the front on purpose, like we were professionals with a purpose, no nonsense cut to the chase types. We whispered to Josiah, like he was our savant expert, there to give us advice on our animal choices.
I can't say that we ever understood what the bid was, much less who was bidding. The only thing we knew for sure was that the animals in the ring at any given time were indeed the central focus. The ring master who opens the pen door has a stick to keep the animals moving. It was apparent the cows in this case, were to never stand still. The cows all seemed to be saving up for this occasional large amounts of what we would call diarrhea. When the man wasn't chasing them in circles with the stick he was jumping sideways to stay as clean as possible, and sweeping wood shavings over the accidents with his boots as they developed. Josiah thought this was possibly the whole point of the game because it was the only thing that had a regular rhythm to it.
The arena is built in a half circle with two or three steps to every level and maybe four or five levels leading up to the rafters in the back of the house. There were probably two dozen English farmers with the rest being Amish farmers.The arena was pretty full so we just stood by the door we came in, and tried not to bid accidentally.
From where we stood just below us was the door that opened to let the animals in and as the door swung open, there were three concrete pillars painted white and red. They stood about six feet tall, were spaced 8 inches apart and were perhaps eight inches diameter each. I thought they were some sort of heavy duty door stops set at angle in the corner of the ring. It became apparent that these were "a ring masters protection device". A cow came into the ring and the man wiggled behind these pillars and opted to stay there rather than chase the cow around the ring. I thought this was an ordinary looking Holstein but something the auctioneer had said during the introduction caused the ringmaster to be very wary. As soon as the cow noticed there was someone behind the pillars she turned and charged, trying every which way to get her head through the pillars or around them. Snorting and pawing the ground as the ring master used that stick around her head with great vigor. It was the best part of the whole show and Josiah cheered the cow with great enthusiasm. (lots of hoots, humma hummas, and Cindy's house...the ultimate cheer of approval)
Bette and Josiah would have stayed all day but I thought an hour was enough to last me for a while and I needed a breath of fresh air. Besides more Amish men had come into our little corner of standing room and it was getting crowded. Bette loves it but she's petrified that the auctioneer may think she is bidding if she scratches her nose. I tell her not to make eye contact and she'll be fine.