Last Thursday I went to the farmer's market at 48th and Baltimore. Amish families set up stands and sell all organic produce and baked goods, meats and chicken.

I love the produce. Beets in yellow, purple, white and orange.
Sweet, fresh, crunchy peas. Vine ripened, "never sprayed" tomatoes that send me back to childhood summer days in New Jersey at Grandmom Jersey's and Aunt Anna Marie and Uncle Joe's garden. I remember the smell of those vines and the dry earth underneath the plants; my hands would itch after picking. Sometimes, I'd eat a tomato like you would an apple, sending it's pulpy juice dripping down my arm, loving the taste of the sun and the sprinkler not really minding the mess. A sprinkle of salt before the last bite was an extra treat.

The Amish all look "nice" to me. I wonder if they really are nice. I ignore the men's long dirty fingernails. I admire the little girls with clean scrubbed faces and perfect backward braids like long yellow silk. They wear their cotton dresses well with bare feet. I think they probably have a few dresses and no one dies from the lack of a full closet. I bought some organic, little red potatoes and rasberries from one stand and as I picked up my bag I sent a container flying to the grassy ground. The man, obviously the father, looked in a very controlled astonished way, as if his daughter's eyes just fell from their sockets, to the tumbling berries. He and his daughters remained calm. "Oh, I am so sorry", I said. I felt terrible. "Shall I pay you for those?" I asked. He shook his head in a no motion very calmly as he started to gather up the berries and I could tell this was a serious matter to him. "We'll gather them up and bring them home to use, they'll be fine after a washing". I apologized again and tried not to seem like I was darting for the car as I was darting for the car. I felt so Un Amish when rethinking my apology. Obviously, money was the reason they were there but it seemed to mean less than their hard earned products.

Freshly baked bread and cherry cake and banana bread, and pecan pie served us well this past week. I savored all of the fruit from that market thinking about those actual people planting and watering and harvesting. All that time and energy must make a person proud and cause a build up of integrity.

I guess there really isn't much time for manicures.

There is a thought (a few) I think often that kind of blows my mind.

We, as humans, as God's greatest creation, are capable and infinitely able to produce, factor, create, think, love, form, birth, encompass, develop, envelope, teach, learn, interpret, and infiltrate so much more than we do. Our scale and scope is wider and higher and thicker and deeper than we can even imagine. Why don't we exercise that gift? Why do we settle for so much less? Why do we waste the small amount of time we are given on this earth for nonsense and small stuff?

Just think about our potential.

I get so weary from all the talking and the chatter and the daily unconscious behavior and thinking we all do.

We need to open our eyes, see what is not so evident, do more, live higher, learn and teach and grow. THINK. Forget the obsessions with skin deep beauty, shallow accomplishments, extreme materialism, and reiterated gossip.

We need to take charge of ourselves, take care of ourselves, love ourselves and then do it all for another too.

Children can skim through the books to get to the next grade but we really should pay more attention. WE ARE THE ADULTS. And all those headaches we have...forget it...just forget it. Learn to love and care and do good. Nothing else matters. And then teach yourself something to teach others after you so they can therefore discover another layer, a higher level, a deeper lever. We should be progressing in greater numbers.

It is embarrassing to me that ancient civilizations had more thought provoking lives than we do today. All this convenience and stuff has us all going through the motions and being stagnant.

What about the cultures that speak 7 languages, plant and grow and cook their own food instead of eating out of bags laden with sodium? What about the cultures who never take medication, even in their 80th and 90th years? Why do we worry about our grey hair and not our shrinking minds? Why do we just allow the world to take us over, dictate our lives, gobble up our money, influence our children, and pollute our souls?

Why do we allow our kids to have things they don't need and some things that downright hurt them? Why do we let them watch too many hours of bad T.V.? Why do we let them eat coco puffs for breakfast? WHY?
Why, when they are given a challenging book to read for school, do WE (not me on this one) read it and then do the book report? I don't get it?

Why don't more of us know how to build houses, understand poetry, recite what we really feel, play instruments, care for our own children and our own elders. Why do we all run? Why do we think we make things easier for ourselves when all we do is make things harder? Why are not more people just plain happier.

Why don't we let our kids fail? Fall? Get hurt? Wear dirty sneakers? Be kids?
Why don't we care that teenagers and children are having plastic surgery just to be a bit prettier?

Why do we encourage our kids to learn to ? (golf, drive, gamble, worry, play video games, pierce, tatoo, adapt, be disrespectful, want, need, be controlled) but not learn to eat?
Why do we not care that most of us want a cure for cancer but no one wants to look for one themselves?

When we read, do we get the message? Do we read?
When we hear a song, do we feel the intention? Do we listen? Do the instruments move us?
Why do we clamor at popular athletes, yet, dismiss a beautiful ballet? Not everyone loves ballet like I do, I know, but, is the obsession with athletes due to sensationalism or is it true awe?

What about people who express themselves but make our world uglier? Graffiti? Criminals? Vulgar song writers and singers? Processed food? Harmful chemicals? Government involvement?

When we feel ill or sad or unable to do something we want to do, we go to a doctor who gives us a pill because that is what we want. We don't want to put any effort into anything, we don't want to change or think about the problem. WE want a cure. WE want to be controlled, to be guided. We ask for it. Sometimes, the doctor, or nurse tries to tell us how we can help ourselves, what we should be doing or not doing...we barely hear it. We want the pill, the controller. We want to get back to our TV and our games and our coco puffs. We want to not think about it.

Sometimes I think we deserve the horrible...we tolerate it, allow it, even pay for it and look for it...so I think it is safe to say we are dumb enough to have to endure it.

When the breeze blows do we close the windows or let our hair fly about us? Do we sacrifice what is truly sacred and special for more nonsense?

How many people think to teach your children to enjoy the simplest things in life is to bring them happiness? You say yes but you do not practice it. Can we travel, learn, and really SEE, let it sink in and then use it for further good or do we need tons of action that is meaningless?

Maybe I just am different from the middle world?

These thoughts I think often, and wish I could stop.

The one message I am trying to convey is that we are all so much more than we realize. I want more people to realize that. I want us to exercise that potential a little bit more...me too! It is a real shame to not!

1 whole sage breakfast sausage
2 packages frozen spinach, drained and dried well
about 10 finely crushed saltines
3 lbs. Ricotta
1-1/2 cups of locatelli cheese grated
2 eggs
fresh chopped parsley
salt and pepper
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg (freshly grated if possible)

dough:
white unbleached flour...about 3 lbs
6 eggs
2 TBS olive oil
tap water...about a cup to start

pour the flour on a large marble or wooden board
make a mountain
make a hole in the middle
crack the eggs in the whole
add olive oil
mix
add water until dough is pliable but not sticking to your hands..add flour if too sticky

knead well until smooth

allow to rest

FILLING:
render the sausage (break it all up, fry it without oil, allow it to cool and make sure it is finely separated)(you can put in food processor for few minutes after draining)

spinach must be dry...can use fresh spinach but steam quickly and then drain and dry (actually squeeze out the water)

mix sausage and spinach with ricotta, eggs, salt, pepper, grated locatelli cheese and nutmeg

only use finely crushed crackers if seems very wet, otherwise skip

mix all ingredients well

Arranging
cut pieces of dough, roll out thin on floured board
use about a tablespoon of filling for each ravioli
flap dough over and cut with pasta cutter sealing edges well

I flash freeze my ravioli on cookie sheets and then put in zip lock bags and cook in boiling salted water while frozen until cooked..about 10-15 minutes.

Cover with homemade tomato sauce and cheese.

Let me know if anyone makes these and how they turn out..the more you do it the easier it gets...it is time consuming...

makes over 100 raviolis depending on size

"Reasons to Live" by Amy Hempel

A book of about 15 short stories that is brilliant. I'll read anything she writes.

My five favorite smells:

(1)The trees in the park across from my house exude a honeysuckle scent across the street through my open windows. Deep breaths and everything smells clean and fresh and I thank God for these small precious presents.

(2)The city is hot and sticky and muggy and so is my car as I drive from the city to the shore. As I go over the little bridge that takes me onto the island, I roll down all the windows and throw the hot muggy air out as the misty, briny air fills my lungs with damp and dew. The beach sand and waves present themselves to my mind's eye and I hear the water lap and swish at the bulkhead of the bay. I thank God again for this precious little present.

(3)Steaming basmati rice.

(4)My husband.

(5)My youngest son's hair.

(6) My mom.