The trip from Goshen to Akron, Pennsylvania began at Saturday noon with Roy and Lois Hartzler providing the transportation. We spent the night at Clearfield, Pennsylvania.
Sexuality, God’s Gift, Second Edition was loaned to The Old Fool for the trip by Rachel Nafziger Hartzler. Rachel’s chapter titled “The Gift after Losing a Spouse” was of special interest. This sparked conversation for part of the trip. Rachel helpfully defined sexuality and intimacy and The Old Fool understood in a new way that there is sexuality without intimacy and there may be intimant friendships without sex.
The Old Fool always enjoys the mountains of Western Pennsylvania. Roy called them tortured mountains. As a science teacher he knows about the pressures that pushed the mountains up through the earth’s crust, the glaciers that carved them out and the elements that wore them down.
Africa House
Lois, Roy, and The Old Fool were given rooms in MCC’s Africa House for Sunday night. That evening we had a stimulating visit with Lois’s cousin Connie Stafuffer at Landis Homes. Then we returned to the Africa House. Three words describe the house: beautiful, hard, and simple.
Ray Byler
On our return to Goshen on Monday, Roy was drawn to the kishacoquillas Valley, his ancestral home. We had 30 minutes in the home of Ray Byler, Roy’s cousin. Ray Byler has a renarkable memory and loves to tell stories. Some of the stories he heard from his mother who also had the knack of telling stories till near her 100th year.
Before leaving the valley we stopped at the Paetz Country Store and bought scrapple and a special licorice candy.
My Mother Katie Peachey Stoltzfus was born and raised in Belleville, Pa. Some interesting land and beautiful country. She passed away in Lewisburg in 2012 at the age of 91. Very interesting…thanks
Thanks for letting us know about the Hershberger book and MCC’s Africa House!