We recently had a chance to visit the place where my ancestors immigrated from Germany and purchased farmland. We literally walked down memory lane for a little while – an experience that felt both wonderful and bittersweet.

THE PLACE
My great-great-grandfather came to Dittmer, Missouri, to spare his sons from enlisting in the German army – but after all that effort, they enlisted in an American war anyway. We always speculated that perhaps the rolling hills reminded them of the terrain they had left behind, and that’s why they chose to settle there. The next generation raised nine children in a one-bedroom home with a sleeping loft and an outhouse. One of the nine, my grandfather Amandus, later built his own kit home a hundred yards down the road and began farming. My dad grew up there – and in some ways, so did I.

My dad didn’t become a farmer, choosing instead a career in biochemistry after college. We grew up in the suburbs of St. Louis, about thirty minutes away. We visited often, and sometimes Dad was asked to help with the hay — and we kids “helped” too. Amandus drove the tractor while we rode atop swaying bales, assisting as best we could in the hard, hot work of the season. Sometimes we rode the flatbed just for fun, a devilish grin flashing across Grandpa’s face as he hit every dip on purpose, picking up speed while we squealed and he laughed. Mostly, though, we roamed, explored, and soaked it all in.

THE BUILDINGS
Amandus bought the kit in the 1940s for $1,400 and built it with a crew that probably consisted of cousins and brothers. It looks a little different now, but the porch still offers the same view of the creek and field. It’s the same place where my Grandparents always stood and waved goodbye until we disappeared from sight. Just over the rise are the barns, standing pungent and hushed. They hold their own type of beauty and the promise of endless play, a very different type of play than the suburbs offered.

Around the side, the walk-out basement door is a passage to a world filled with memory. Cold, one-liter glass 7Up bottles – too big for our hands – appeared from there, handed out by Grandpa after a turn at driving the tractor. Cut wood for heating the home was stacked just inside the door, cedar logs perfuming the air. It remains the best smell I can remember.

On special occasions, a long table was set up in the basement so we could all sit together, passing bowls family-style, this abundance made possible by Lillian’s quiet, tireless work in the kitchen. Punch bowls with floating sherbet rings added to the festivities. We played with tiny barn kittens, tried to talk to cows, tended gardens heavy with strawberries, daydreamed under a tree, and so much more – I could write a book about all we did. Maybe I will someday.

When I was a teenager my parents decided to build a little cabin near Grandpa’s fishing pond. They dreamed it, sketched it, and built it with their own hands, much to Grandpa’s delight. That cabin on the pond saw a lot of fun, three graduation parties, many rowing contests, a Christmas tree farm, and one short-lived dunebuggy.

THE DECORATING
Grandma Lillian made a few humble decorative choices that still stand out in my memory. Four ceramic fruit sculptures lined the kitchen wall and often caught my eye as a young girl. A framed cross-stitched Serenity Prayer hung in the living room, and I can’t count how many times I studied it until its meaning slowly made sense.

Lillian’s Christmas décor was wonderfully nostalgic and consistent: a cedar tree cut from the farm, tinsel, and bold, colorful bulbs that cast a warm (hot!) glow as we crawled underneath to read the gift tags in a hopeful search for our names. The upstairs bedrooms were spare, but the girls’ room was painted a soft mint green that has made quite a comeback in recent years, as many are craving the nostalgic comfort of yesteryear. My Dad’s room had a little high school pennant, and a storage trunk that I believe was a graduation gift from a local furniture company to graduating seniors.

For the most part, though, we spent the most time in the spaces not decorated by human hands. Two-lane rock roads crunched underfoot. Familiar fences, barns, and hay bales gave way to two hundred eighty acres of divided pastures rolling toward forested hills, held together by stillness.

THE FEELING
I remember that it was there, walking across one of those pastures, that I first sensed Emmanuel, God with me, at about twelve years old. It came not through words, but as a quiet presence revealed in the low hum of insects and a gentle breeze.

Sometimes I dream about buying back a piece of that land and creating a gathering place. Perhaps we could build a barndominium where we might try to recapture some of the magic we were so fortunate to experience as children. It’s more likely, though, that the magic will live on only in the retelling.