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 - O HIO
Matt Yoder SA L E S A DV ISO R - M IC HIA N A + P ENNSY LVANI A
Aaron Stutzman E DITO R IA L M A N AG E R
Nic Stoltzfus Q UA L IT Y A SSU RA N C E / BO O K K EEP I NG
Sabrina Schlabach
WHAT WE BELIEVE... 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 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 A RC H A D C LO SE
February 7, 2023 WR IT E R – WHISP E RS O F HO P E
Darren Gagnon 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 – JU N E BE R RY HIL L SCH O O LH O U S E
Lisa Miller 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 WIDOW ' S 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 – SE RV IN G O U R N E IG H B O R
Elaine Tomski 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
P.O. Box 201, 2106 Main Street Winesburg, OH 44690 P HO N E
FA X
330-601-6106
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E M A IL
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www.plainvalues.com This publication and its contents are © 2023, Plain Target Marketing, LLC. Individual copyrighted items, trademarks, etc. contained within are the property of their respective copyright holders. No part of this publication may be reproduced or redistributed by any means without authorization from the publisher. Publisher is not responsible for advertisers’ offers, products, or services, and publication neither expresses nor implies an endorsement. PLAIN VALUES
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February 2023 // Issue 116 // The Education Issue
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CONFESSIONS OF A STEWARD Learning Through Experience
ROOTS + WINGS Re-Imagining the One-Room Schoolhouse
COLUMN BY: JOEL SALATIN
COLUMN BY: RORY FEEK
Joel is often known for his vast knowledge of farming, but how did Joel Salatin become the man he is today? To him, experience is the king of all educators.
Rory shares the story of Hardison Mill School, the one-room schoolhouse he built on his farm out of a desire to rethink what education could look like for his daughter, Indiana.
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THE HEALING LAND Rural Free
THE WIDOWS PATH Getting Married... Again
COLUMN BY: SHAWN & BETH DOUGHERTY
COLUMN BY: FERREE HARDY
Shawn and Beth share their thoughts on how a close-knit community impacts the education of the younger generation— especially when the neighbors gather for pig processing day.
This month, Ferree tackles the touchy subject of remarriage. Dealing with widowhood is challenging enough, but the idea of getting married again brings about unique challenges of its own.
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ON THE COVER Hardison Mill School, the one-room schoolhouse that Rory dreamed of for his daughter, Indiana, and other children in his community.
Room to Bloom Report Whispers of Hope: Sunshine for the Soul One Minute With Marlin What If We'd Build a Schoolhouse? Prayers for the Nations: Angola
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THE ROUNDTABLE Amish Insights on: Education
HOMESTEAD LIVING Life Lessons
COLUMN BY: EMILY HERSHBERGER & DANIEL MILLER
COLUMN BY: MELISSA K. NORRIS
Two new writers, Emily and Daniel, join us this month to answer the question: "What are your thoughts on the role education plays in a community?"
This month, Melissa shares how her view on education has changed over the years, and how God used her writing career as an unexpected learning opportunity.
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HONEST CONVERSATIONS WITH WENDY Proof of God
SERVING OUR NEIGHBOR Pork Rhyne: The Pork Evangelist
COLUMN BY: WENDY CUNNINGHAM
WORDS BY: ELAINE TOMSKI
Wendy concludes the story of her personal journey to Jesus with a compelling and inspirational testament to the proof that God is real, and Jesus is indeed who He says He is.
If you haven't heard of The Pork Evangelist yet, you surely won't forget him after reading how Jesus, and pigs, got ahold of his heart and changed his life forever.
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whispers of hope
S U P P O RT F O R T H O S E W H O F O ST E R + A D O P T
Sunshine for the Soul COLUMN BY:
I WAS TEACHING IN A JAIL a few weeks ago, and one of the inmates stopped me while I was encouraging her to journal about her painful past experiences. She looked at me and said, “I could never journal about my trauma, because if I write it down, it makes it real.” As I thought about this, I realized there must be so many in our society struggling with their past, looking for a way to escape their pain and make it "not seem real." Horrific experiences can cause us to become stuck in the past. Even if we have seemingly moved on, our minds and emotions are still anchored in those past experiences. If these horrific events happened to us as children, we would likely have little to no memory of exactly what happened. We may have a few memories that are frozen in time that sometimes creep up when we are triggered by something. A smell. A sound. A
“Keep your face always toward the sunshine—and shadows will fall behind you.” – Walt Whitman
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Darren Gagnon
place. But our bodies know. And our behaviors and reactions tip others off that we are suffering internally. We may get angry quickly, be unable to communicate our emotions well, or have difficulty with stable relationships. If we were hurt by someone we should have been able to trust, we can’t easily trust again. Bessel van der Kolk, in his book The Body Keeps the Score, shares the following: Long after a traumatic experience is over, it may be reactivated at the slightest hint of danger and mobilize disturbed brain circuits and secrete massive amounts of stress hormones. This precipitates unpleasant emotions, intense physical sensations, and impulsive and aggressive actions. These posttraumatic reactions feel incomprehensible and overwhelming. These overwhelming experiences can be traumatic enough to cause actual physiologic changes to our brain. We may have increased stress hormones produced, making us feel like there’s danger all around us. This causes high levels of anxiety and toxic stress, which in turn may cause illness and reactivity. It has been said that the greatest source of our suffering are the lies we tell ourselves. When we are
unable or refuse to acknowledge the painful realities of our traumatic experiences, we are also unable to completely recover from them. The memories will persist, and the unresolved trauma will manifest in different ways. We tell ourselves it was our fault. We believe it couldn’t have really happened the way we remember it, and that we just need to forget and move on. These are lies our minds tell us to help us survive. But they are just that. Lies. When we are ready, and with the right support, we can revisit the past and confront the pain. This is likely to be a challenging and emotional experience not to be taken lightly. But the cure is in the pain. This means that the best way to resolve our trauma is to not ignore it or hope it will go away but to revisit the traumatic experience in our mind and process what happened to us.
A good friend of mine once said, shine some sunshine in those dark places, and they will no longer be so dark. As scary as it might be, there is something powerful about bringing things into the light. This is a common theme throughout scripture as there are 235 passages that reference light. In the Old Testament, Psalm 18:28, David thanks God for His faithfulness and His redemption. He says, “...my God turns my darkness into light.” In the New Testament, John 1:5 says, “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” Jesus himself used this imagery in John 8, saying “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” If you have been burying your painful past, maybe it is time to look for someone to help you shine some sunshine in those dark spaces and allow the author of light to bring healing. //
Darren Gagnon, along with his wife, Stacey, are the founders of Lost Sparrows. They can be reached at P.O. Box 751, Winona Lake, IN 46590. Learn more about Lost Sparrows at www.lostsparrows.org. PLAIN VALUES FEBRUARY 2023
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One Minute with Marlin THE FAMILY IS SETTLING into the house that’s going to be our home for the next three days. I've driven 500 miles, and I'm trying to catch a bit of rest on the couch before we head out to dinner with friends. Half awake, I hear a little scritching sound and little bits of creosote falling down the chimney, but I don’t think much of it. Suddenly, a flash of fur hangs down from inside the fireplace, and I leap to my feet and jam the fire screen against the opening, all the while yelling, “Get outta here!” I cannot believe what a close call that was. The next two days were even worse. Both of our moms and the three kids periodically had to stop what they were doing and run to the fireplace to chase the intruder back up the chimney. It was a game of cat and mouse, and our kids thoroughly enjoyed it! But then Saturday evening came. The event that we were going to was the purpose of the trip, and we all headed out the door soon after dinner. We discussed the fireplace situation, and I think I said something to the effect of, “Well, those things go to bed at night, don’t they?” We came back to the home away from home, and as I walked in, I noticed a few Christmas
decorations lying on their side by the fireplace, but again, I didn’t think anything of it. As I walked on into the kitchen, I saw a wooden star lying on the kitchen floor next to a broken plastic plate. By this time, the rest of the family had made their way in and apparently realized what I had not, because I heard someone say, “Marlin, that squirrel is still in the house—it’s got to be here somewhere!” We started looking under the couch and behind the furniture, and I checked the bedrooms. Not more than a few minutes later, someone hollered out, “It’s in the Christmas tree!” And it was game on! We got the kids downstairs, and I realized that we had a real problem on our hands. How in the world are we going to get this squirrel out of the house? We tried a few things, including trying to scoot the Christmas tree closer to the door, which only made the squirrel leap onto the curtains. At one point, my mom was trying to keep it at bay by the front door using two sweatshirts as weapons! After about fifteen minutes and much hollering, we had a squirrel locked in the bathroom. I will say, you have not lived till every single curtain has been violated, and you have squirrel scat on the kitchen floor! With the biggest trashcan I could find and a Styrofoam cooler lid, I marched into the bathroom to do battle—at least that’s what it felt like! After a few minutes of highpitched squealing (the squirrel’s, not mine), I emerged victorious with the angry squirrel contained and wasted no time getting outside. What a wonderfully hilarious Christmas vacation memory! If we only had an RV! As always, may you find joy in the simple things. //
MARLIN MILLER publisher, always looking for more friends
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Confessions of a Steward JOEL SALATIN
COLUMN BY:
Learning through Experience "HOW DO I LEARN WHAT I NEED TO KNOW?" This is one of the most common questions people ask when jumping into a farm or garden enterprise. The heritage understanding that permeated deep into the culture a century ago is largely lost. That means newbies are starting from scratch and have no rudimentary understanding about basic farming procedures. The regular learning recipe is fairly straightforward: books, instructional videos (including YouTube), workshops, mentoring, and experience. Although I’ve written a bunch of books and now do instructional videos (Farm Like a Lunatic), I’m going to concentrate on the experience component of this educational recipe. My mentor, Allan Nation, said experience was the best and fastest way to learn. I agree, with one caveat: the experience scale must be in sync with your knowledge. In other words, if you know little, do little. One of the most common mistakes newbies make is starting too big. Building castles in the sky is much easier than building them on the ground.
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photos by Millpond Photography
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Just for fun, let me dig into a question I received today from a first-time chicken grower. Probably his big mistake was starting his first batch in November instead of late spring or early summer when the ambient temperature is better. He lost half of the chicks in a week and asked why. Of course, I’m supposed to give an answer with nothing more than that. At any rate, I responded with a list of possible issues. Too cold. Chicks need to be around 93 degrees Fahrenheit for the first couple of days. They are highly subject to pneumonia and almost any respiratory issue. In the brooder, you’re trying to recreate the hen’s body temperature and care; that doesn’t give you a lot of latitude. The way you know they’re just right is if the group huddles under the heat with a donut in the center. In other words, right where the heat is the most intense, you don’t want any chicks lounging. They will find their perfect warmth somewhere around the heat circle, but if they clump up right under where the heat is most intense, it means they’re too cold. Too hot. If the birds congregate around the edges of the brooder, away from the heat source, they’re too hot. Excessive heat is generally not as devastating as excessive cold, but it still creates
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"One of the most common mistakes newbies make is starting too big. Building castles in the sky is much easier than building them on the ground." discomfort and makes the birds lethargic. Nobody wants to run around when they’re overheated. Too much temperature fluctuation. Chicks can handle a few minutes of cold—allowing them time to run out and get something to eat or drink— but they can’t be away from heat for long. The main problem is overall temperature fluctuation due to not having a well-regulated heat source. Typically this happens between cool nights and hot afternoons. If you set the heat for night, the birds roast in the afternoon if the sun is bright. By the same token, if you check them during the afternoon and realize the birds are too hot, you can’t wait to adjust the heat back to night strength
two hours after dark. This is why good hovers have thermostats to cut the heat on and off according to ambient temperature. Draft. Chicks need fresh air, but they can’t handle a draft. Fresh air needs to come in above them, not at their level. Chicks don’t like crosswinds. Once they get a few days old, you can open things up a bit more, but initially, the air needs to be still. Wet. Nothing creates health issues in chicks as fast as getting wet. Moisture sucks out their body heat. With all that fluff, if they get wet, they get hypothermia in a minute. To warm them up, you can put them in an oven, literally. That’s what it takes to overcome getting wet. They can get wet from drips in the ceiling, falling into a watering pan, or being too thirsty and hogging in too much water too fast. Filth. The most common culprit here is capped bedding, or no bedding. Chick batteries with mesh floors have certainly been used for a long time, but a mesh floor doesn’t let a chick do anything it naturally wants to do. The chick can’t scratch, fluff, or get antibodies generated from microbes in a deep, hygienic bedding. Newspapers are slick, and they cause slipped tendons. They also don’t absorb the manure; carbon bedding needs to be fluffy. Other bedding material that doesn’t work: wood chips are too big to scratch around;
straw mats together and caps over quickly; sawdust is too powdery and packs quickly. The ideal bedding is wood shavings—curly and bouncy. Incorrect nutrition. I don’t have enough time to go into all the nuances here, but this is especially an issue with either homemade feed rations or minimalistic industrial rations. The birds need grit on day one to get their gizzards off to a good start. The fast-growing meat hybrids are not nearly as forgiving as the old standardbred dual-purpose birds. Dirty water. The industry developed nipple drinkers for a reason—they’re clean. We use them exclusively in our brooder, and they are a game changer versus the gallon jug with red trough. If you haven’t graduated to nipples yet, at least elevate those little drinkers so the birds need to stretch just a bit to get a drink. Put a wooden block or two underneath to protect the drinking tray from birds walking or pooping in it. If you wouldn’t drink it, your chicks probably shouldn’t either. Inadequate feed or water. This has to do with linear space. You don’t need enough space for every bird to get feed and water at the same time, but you definitely need enough space for a quarter of them to access at once. They’ll rotate around at that linear access, but only if the feeders and waterers never go empty. The moment they go empty, the quarter access
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