The Sider Road Name

The Sider family hailed from Germany and settled in Stevensville, Canada three generations ago. Typically, Mennonite children attended school through the seventh grade; when they came of age, the men worked in the fields and the women worked as housemaids. My grandmother, in Buffalo, NY, hired Lydia Sider as a housekeeper way back when. Every day, Lydia traveled from her farm to my grandmother’s home, dressed in her traditional dress and bonnet, and quietly went about her work. Eventually, Lydia married and her sister Emma took over at my grandmother's. Then, when my mother married and had a son, Emma moved to my parents house.

She stayed with our family for 50 years, sharing her grace, religion, harmonica playing, and love of flowers and cooking. I always will consider her another mother.

Emma and her four siblings lived together in the Sider farmhouse on Sider Road. In fact, much of my own childhood was spent at “The Farm,” a working 250-acre homestead. I spent countless weekends, summers, and holidays roaming the tall grass, wheat fields, and animal stalls. I learned to milk cows, tend to chickens, ducks and pigs, work a tractor, bail hay, pick corn and berries, and discovered the benefits of trapping foxes.

The five-bedroom, two-story house was heated with a single wood stove; this, along with hand-sewn family quilts, provided all the warmth one needed. I remember carefully watching the women of the house sew, and tried my best to copy their handiwork. I even attended church with the Siders, sitting with other single women during services, and learned many Christian hymns. I loved Emma and her family with every fiber of my being; I couldn’t get enough of their way of life and their joy in the simple things animals and plants offered.

The farmhouse, filled with these wonderful memories, still stands.

There's a point to this story, other than making myself feel good. It's about what happens when cultures intersect. Although not Mennonite, I welcomed becoming immersed in traditions very different from my own. Both the Siders and my own family offered comfort, kindness, and delicious food. All cultures have strengths and weaknesses, good points and bad, and, together, teach us to see “gray” in the world. Things are not simply black and white. There is incredible possibility when we ask questions versus simply assuming.

With that, Sider Road was launched. - Jocelyn