P U BL ISHE R
WHO WE ARE... From 2007 to 2012 we, the Millers, adopted our first three children, a preschooler on the autism spectrum and two babies with Down syndrome. We published our first issue of Plain Values in 2012 to highlight biblical ministries, share the beauty of adoption, and to cultivate anchored community. In 2018 we welcomed our fourth child in a surprise adoption, this time a baby with Mosaic Down syndrome. We homeschool our family and enjoy working together to grow and raise food on our twelve acre homestead.
Marlin Miller SA L E S A DV ISO R
Matt Yoder SA L E S A DV ISO R
Aaron Stutzman SA L E S A DV ISO R
Chris Conant Q UA L IT Y A SSU RA N C E / BO O K K EEP I NG
WHAT WE BELIEVE...
Sabrina Schlabach
Our values are plain values, steeped in the rich traditions of yesterday. We enjoy the simple things in life. Gathering eggs from the coop, getting our hands in the dirt to grow food, and cooking meals from scratch. Sometimes we sit around a fire and share life. We strive to walk humbly to strengthen authentic relationships with our families and neighbors. And, yes, we have taken a fresh pie to a front porch and surprised a friend… we didn’t even text them before! We just stopped by, walked up the steps, and knocked on the door! Just the way our grandparents used to do on a Sunday evening. They called it living in community. We seek to serve our neighbors. Plain Values began with a prayer, hoping to play a small role in connecting a child with Down syndrome to his or her forever family. We have checked that box more than twenty times—and counting—and we will not stop until the orphanages are empty! We will rest in Heaven!
P RO DU C T IO N M A N AG E R
Isaac Hershberger M U LT I- M E DIA P RO DU C T IO N
Seth Yoder O F F IC E M A N AG E R /C U STO M ER S ERVI C E
Jan Schlabach M AY A D C LO SE
April 6, 2023 WR IT E R – CO N F E SSIO N S O F A ST EWAR D
Joel Salatin WR IT E R – RO OTS + WIN GS
HOW YOU CAN HELP... Join us as we pursue a more authentic life. By subscribing to Plain Values, a portion of each subscription goes directly to Room to Bloom, our non-profit that supports children with special needs.
Rory Feek WR IT E R – T HE G RA N DFAT HE R EFFEC T
Brian Dahlen WR IT E RS – T HE RO U N DTA BL E
Emily Hershberger & Daniel Miller
JOIN US FOR PORCH TIME! Every third Friday from 1:00pm – 4:00pm
Stop by, enjoy a cup of coffee or tea, sit on the porch, and visit for a while. We'd love to get to know you! We're located in the heart of Winesburg, Ohio—just down the street from the church.
WR IT E R – HO M E ST E A D L IV IN G
Melissa K. Norris WR IT E RS – T HE HE A L IN G L A N D
Shawn & Beth Dougherty WR IT E R – T HE WIDOWS PAT H
Ferree Hardy WR IT E R – HO N E ST CO N V E RSAT I O NS
Wendy Cunningham WR IT E R – BOT H HA N DS
Nic Stoltzfus WR IT E R – SE RV IN G O U R N E IG H B O R
Rebecca Greenfield CO N T R IBU T IN G P HOTO G RA PH ERS Millpond Photography Landon Troyer Photography Ashley Rivers Photography
Plain Values is published monthly by Plain Target Marketing, LLC. Please contact us with any questions. A DDR E SS
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April 2023 // Issue 118
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CONFESSIONS OF A STEWARD High Pathogen Avian Influenza
ROOTS + WINGS Build It and They Will Come
COLUMN BY: JOEL SALATIN
COLUMN BY: RORY FEEK
Perhaps no agricultural topic right now creates a sharper contrast between the “life is biology” versus “life is mechanics” philosophy than High Pathogen Avian Influenza (HPAI).
Rory's hope is that his farm will continue leaning into the mission of teaching homesteading skills to folks who are interested in learning them all throughout the year.
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HOMESTEAD LIVING Spring Foraging
THE HEALING LAND Planting Potatoes
COLUMN BY: MELISSA K. NORRIS
COLUMN BY: SHAWN & BETH DOUGHERTY
Foraging was a term Melissa learned long after she learned the art of it. Every spring, she would anxiously wait for the tell-tale signs that morel hunting was ready to begin.
It's the Friday before Easter, potato-planting day. The whole family is in the garden patch where we grow Pontiac, Kennebec, and Yukon Gold potatoes.
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ON THE COVER Melissa K. Norris, lover of traditional, old-fashioned skills, preparing for Spring. photo © Cheryl Constable
Room to Bloom Report One Minute with Marlin Both Hands Exile International
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THE GRANDFATHER EFFECT Part Two – Vietnam
THE ROUNDTABLE Amish Insights on: Big Families
WORDS BY: BRIAN DAHLEN
COLUMN BY: EMILY HERSHBERGER & DANIEL MILLER
This month, we continue our multi-part series with Brian Dahlen as he recounts what it was like for his father to be drafted into the Vietnam War and the effects it had on his family.
Emily and Daniel answer the question: "Springtime is such a busy time of the year for homesteaders. How do you keep such large families seemingly so organized during busy seasons?"
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THE WIDOWS PATH An "EKG" for Grieving Hearts
HONEST CONVERSATIONS WITH WENDY A Reluctant Homeschool Mom
COLUMN BY: FERREE HARDY
COLUMN BY: WENDY CUNNINGHAM
Just as an electrocardiogram (EKG) records the electrical signal from the physical heart, Ferree uses the letters E-K-G to measure conditions in a grieving heart.
"I wasn’t a teacher. Although I had my bachelor’s degree, it was in theater performance, for goodness’ sake. And besides, I worked! There was just no way."
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One Minute with Marlin
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A FEW MONTHS BACK, I shared how our 10-year-old
questions afterward. So, this is an open invitation for
son, Bennett, has been gaining in his communication skills. He is signing more and slowly adding to his small but wonderful bank of spoken words, not to mention the tremendous growth in his reading and writing skills. Recently, he added the best yet—in fact, the words that all parents long to hear. Bennett began saying “I love you!” It has been a massive blessing to watch him grow and learn how to communicate at a deeper level, and Lisa and I are hopeful and optimistic that he can and will learn how to share much more. Darcy Day is mom to Brady, a young man who has Down syndrome. For the first 18 years of his life, he was completely locked inside, not having a method of communication that worked for him to share what he was thinking about. That is until Darcy found Spelling to Communicate and dared to wonder if things could be different for her son. Today, Brady shares his thoughts and feelings rather openly, even writing beautiful poetry. Spelling to Communicate is a gross motor skillset that was developed and geared to individuals on the autism spectrum. After learning about the program, Darcy simply applied and tweaked it to her son and has seen truly incredible results. There is a new documentary premiering in April called Spellers that takes a close look at the stories coming out of this work. After coming home from the Down syndrome conference, where we met Darcy, Lisa did her own research and found a practitioner an hour from our home. After connecting with Samantha Fox, we decided to host an evening of learning. We will share the movie at our office, and Samantha will join us in the discussion and answer
any and all to join us on May 5th in Winesburg at 6 pm. If you are curious and have questions about how Spelling to Communicate might help someone you love, or if you are interested in becoming a trained practitioner, please come. You can learn more about the documentary at spellersthemovie.com. Below is a quote from Samantha with a brief description of the S2C method: “Spelling to Communicate (S2C) is an alternative method of communication that is used for individuals who show difficulty expressing themselves through speech. These individuals may be non-speaking, minimally speaking, or unreliably speaking. There is often a disconnect between their brain and their body. With this, they do not have a consistent or reliable way of demonstrating their understanding or expressing their thoughts. These individuals are often labeled as “low functioning” or as having a “severe” cognitive/language disorder. S2C addresses the disconnect between the brain and the body by teaching the purposeful motor skills to point to letters on a letter board. Once the foundational motor skills are built, individuals work towards expressing their wants, needs, and ideas through spelling.” -Samantha Fox M.A., CCC-SLP
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Speech-Language Pathologist Owner, Beyond Speech Therapy Center | S2C Practitioner
We hope to see you May 5th and as always, may you find joy in the simple things. // MARLIN MILLER publisher, always looking for more friends
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PLAIN VALUES APRIL 2023
Confessions of a Steward JOEL SALATIN
COLUMN BY:
High Pathogen avian Influenza PERHAPS NO AGRICULTURAL TOPIC right now creates a sharper contrast between the “life is biology” versus “life is mechanics” philosophy than High Pathogen Avian Influenza (HPAI). In less than a year, the United States has exterminated more than 58 million chickens, turkeys, and ducks by government mandate. For the uninitiated, realize that if one bird in a million on a farm tests positive for HPAI, every bird on that property must be exterminated. The industry uses the term euthanized, but that is not the right word. Euthanizing is what you do to a suffering pet that has no hope of recovery. It’s an end-of-suffering kind of thing. Most of the birds being killed due to HPAI are neither sick nor showing symptoms of being sick; they just happen to be in proximity to sick birds and get caught up in the melee. To be sure, HPAI is a real thing and does kill birds. But just like covid, which is also a real thing, proper responses
photos by Millpond Photography
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vary. The orthodoxy right now is to annihilate every proximate bird, healthy or not. Complete extermination. It’s being done to such an extent these days that our nation now has a Foaming Association that poultry growers can join to be first in line when the extermination order comes. How do you kill 15,000 turkeys in a confinement house? Or 50 million chickens in a layer house? You can’t electrocute. Starvation is too slow. Ah, soap suds. You close all the windows and doors and pump in soap suds that suffocate everything and then dissipate into nothing. All you have after the foam leaves is carcasses to pick up. Efficient and cheap. How many of you want to join the Foaming Association? The official narrative regarding this disease is that it’s spread by wild waterfowl. Isn’t it interesting
"The complete extermination policy makes no sense. If you have a rampant disease, why would you also kill the survivors?" that these supposed carriers don’t themselves succumb to the disease? This brings up an interesting question about how you respond to disease. That question prompts an even deeper question: Why did something get a disease? Or we could even ask what the purpose of disease is? Bible believers understand that we live in a fallen world, where corruption and disease are all a part of losing the Edenic paradise. But clearly, the Pentateuch’s instructions about land, hygiene, religious protocols, and finances indicate that the Israelites would enjoy fewer diseases than other people. Leprosy occurred, but it was rare. Usually, disease or complete functional breakdown occurs because protocols surrounding health aren’t—or weren’t—followed. This includes stress, of course. Envy rots the bones, according to Proverbs. My point is that things don’t break down without a reason. Right now, nobody knows why low-path avian influenza turns into high-path. Nobody actually knows the vectors. In domestic poultry flocks, HPAI devastates, but it never kills all the birds. Somehow in the midst of the catastrophe, some birds never succumb and continue to thrive. All genetic understanding, adaptation, and immunological development indicate that the most reasonable response to HPAI is to protect and propagate the survivors. The complete extermination policy makes no sense. If you have a rampant disease, why would you also kill the survivors? Wouldn’t you want to hang onto them at all costs, breed them, and reward whatever created a more robust immune system? It’s such a simple question, but apparently,
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nobody in the industry is asking it. The official policy is the complete extermination of every bird on the property. Even Darwinian evolutionists promoting survival of the fittest should reject such a nonsensical policy. How do we know which ones are fittest if we kill them all? In order to find the fittest, something must survive. A blanket extermination insures no survivors and therefore no discovery or development regarding fitness. The complete extermination policy flies in the face of reason and our current scientific understanding. Could it be that the reason we don’t see major die-offs in the alleged wild fowl vectors is that over time the susceptible ones did die, and the survivors developed such a robust immune system that even high pathogenic strains aren’t deadly? That thinking certainly dovetails with a reasonable understanding of adaptation and immunological function. HPAI is relatively weak. Temperatures as low as 85 degrees Fahrenheit kill it, which is why it spikes in the winter. For something that weak to decimate the poultry industry indicates profound fragility.
I recently attended the American Pastured Poultry Producers Association (APPPA) annual convention in Dallas and had the privilege of spending time with three growers whose flocks contracted HPAI in 2022. Their stories were grisly and horrifying. Two were hatcheries whose flocks are housed in barns. The other had flocks of 3,000 on pasture. The outdoor bird producer had been dealing with cholera for several years. All three were required to exterminate all their birds, even though all three said their HPAI symptoms were only in a tiny number of their birds. After extermination and disinfection, they were allowed to get back in business quickly. The outdoor grower received a clean bill of health in 45 days. Now folks, I want you to just think about this for a minute. Here’s a farm with 45,000 chickens. They find HPAI in a few and have to kill all 45,000. In less than two months, they can repopulate completely as if nothing had ever happened. If something is lethal enough to demand exterminating more than 42,000 non-symptomatic birds, would you think everything is perfectly fine in 45 days? In the world of biology, 45 PLAIN VALUES
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