Old Order Mennonite Memoirs

Like a sheet of silver, the Aegean Sea shown through the great marble pillars of the grand temple as I knelt to worship before the mighty statue of Athena, the Greek goddess of wisdom. I seemed to stand at the very fringes of immortality and was keyed up to the highest expectation in the mystery of twilight when the world was still and the light was mellow.

But in reality, it was the mellow afternoon light of autumn that surrounded me. The world was not still but the western breath of the blue skies was soft on my arms and my upturned face. In reality I wasn't kneeling at a lifeless statue in...