By Thea Jarvis

When Tony and Trisha Dittmeier decided to move their young family to the Georgia mountains, some of their friends were convinced they had gone off the deep end.

“People thought we were crazy,” Trisha recalled in her new home at Eagle Ranch, her smile not totally masking the remembered pain. “Some would literally turn their backs on us and walk away.”

Leaving a comfortable suburban Atlanta home, secure employment, reliable schools, friendly neighbors and the supportive church community of Holy Cross in Chamblee wasn’t an overnight decision. The Dittmeiers ran into Eddie Staub and his dream nine months before they became Eagle Ranch’s first houseparents.

Trisha says their initial conversation went something like this:

Dittmeiers: “We always wished we could do something radical for the Lord.”

Eddie: “Why don’t you become our houseparents?” Dittmeiers: “We can’t do that.”

Eddie: “Why not?” Dittmeiers: “Well, we just can’t do that, Eddie.” Eddie: “Why not?”

Dittmeiers: “Well, we might come up and visit you and help you out once in a while, but we just can’t do that, Eddie.”

Eddie: “Why not...?”

Staub’s “why nots?” struck an answering chord the Dittmeiers didn’t necessarily want to hear.

“We fought it the whole time but couldn’t get it out of our minds,” Trisha said.

Tony remembers that “We just couldn’t put it away. It just haunted us.” They visited the ranch twice, but on both occasions he refused to step inside Faith Home, convinced that once over the threshold he’d be hooked.

Apart from a general feeling of “not being good enough” to fill the role of houseparents, one of the Dittmeiers’ main concerns was how such an uprooting would affect their children, Andrew, 7, and Emily, 4. But it was Emily who advised her parents of the road they were to travel.

“At the dinner table one night, Emily told us, ‘God’s building us a new house and he’ll tell us when to move,” Trisha said. When this happened more than once, she and Tony started paying attention.

After three weeks of intensive interviews and continuous prayer, the Dittmeiers were told they had been chosen from a field of nine other couples. They had a week to sell their home and move to Chestnut Mountain.

“We couldn’t say no to it,” said Tony. Their house was sold the day after the sign went up and they headed north over Easter weekend.

Nearly six months later, sitting around an oversized oak dining table in that sweep of space that is their first floor, the Dittmeiers seem very much at home. The 5,400 square feet of house - built for $15 per square foot with donations of labor and materials - includes seven bedrooms, a massive stone and wood fireplace, a kitchen that would turn Julia Child purple with envy, and a view that won’t quit.

The laundry room is the equal of a good sized master bedroom, and there Tony has erected a three by nine foot wooden pen. The ranch’s golden retrievers, Conner and Clancy, are the new parents of eight sleepy eyed puppies less than a week old and the laundry seemed a good place for them to begin life in the country. In addition to the pups, the room holds two full sized chest freezers, a sink and small bathroom, and a washer and dryer that Trisha vows “go constantly.”

Nearby, a floor to ceiling pantry holds giant cans of vegetables and fruit. Boxes of cereal and pasta crowd packages of cookies and cake mix. The food is purchased at the Atlanta Food Bank and discount groceries that specialize in quantity buying.

“You would not believe what they eat!” said one staff member of the boys’ mega appetites.

Upstairs, the bedrooms are a study in simplicity. In the boys’ rooms there is space for two beds, a night table, good-sized closets and personal touches -- stuffed bears, posters and pictures, radios and tape players. Each resident is in charge of washing his own laundry and keeping his room in good order.

A large chart that is credit to the Dittmeiers’ organizational skills indicates which of the general pool of chores -- anything from cleaning the bathrooms to vacuuming the floors -- is assigned to each child this week.

“We don’t show any partiality to our own children,” Trisha remarked, and Andrew and Emily’s names can be found on the chart alongside the others.

Because of the size of the household, the daily routine must run like clockwork. Up around six, dress and clean rooms, eat breakfast, make lunches and out the door by eight to attend local Hall county schools. Because buses come early to accommodate a wide geographical area, the Dittmeiers drive the boys to school in the morning and let them take the bus home in the afternoon.

During the week, Tony and Trisha make the 45-minute drive down to Atlanta on two separate days to attend Mass at their home parish, Holy Cross Church, and meet with a small support group formed after their Cursillo weekends. They make short stops for necessities and are home in time for the three o’clock rush.

There is no television on weekdays, and a mandatory study hall follows dinner at 5:30. After homework, a half-hour devotional brings the family together for some quiet time either in the second living room or on the porch overlooking the athletic field.

“We’ve seen double rainbows, sunrises, wild turkey, rabbits and deer from out here,” said Trisha, settling into one of the porch rockers. “Sometimes the boys will bring out their radios at night and watch a storm come up or listen to the rain.”

Not everything, of course, is a sky full of rainbows or fields filled with flowers. The day-to-day grind in any family is a challenge that requires patience and trust. In this special household, these virtues are particularly in demand.

“We live totally on faith up here,” Tony doesn’t hesitate to say. At first, he felt pressured because most of the boys had no experience with male role models. He felt he had to be perfect.

“Now I’m just really comfortable about being myself. I’m at peace with my inadequacies. We concentrate on loving them the best we can,” he said, “and the rest is up to God.”

Trisha agreed. “The kids are learning that people are human. We’re the first to say we’re sorry if we’re wrong.” Before coming to the mountain, the Dittmeiers were active in the right to life and peace movements. They see the flow of their life now as an extension of that work and are candid about not missing the rounds of meetings and social gatherings that are part of the lifestyle they left behind.

“I can’t think of anything I’d rather be doing,” said Tony. As for the future, he feels, “God sent us up here.”

“And God’s going to take us away,” Trisha added with a smile.