This week has been crazy and I have been struggling to pick a product that begin with an S.  Then I found myself craving spaghetti and meatballs, vegan for us of course. I have always loved eating spaghetti ever since I was a child. Well actually it was Spaghettio’s until I discovered real spaghetti with amazing sauce, but that is another story. My wife, however, enjoys when I make spaghetti with homemade Pomodorro Sauce and vegan meatballs. There is something comforting for people about spaghetti and meatballs.

The thing about spaghetti I have found most interesting is that there is more to its history then I knew. When I think spaghetti, I think Italian and my guess is that most people do. However, it seems that the development of pasta, spaghetti in particular, has its roots in Chinese and Arabic cooking. Maybe that is why I enjoy lo mein so much. It reminds me of eating spaghetti, but without the sauce, which I never liked growing up, until I learned how it should be made, and with the vegetables, which I enjoy. Or why some of my favorite Middle Eastern dishes use some sort of pasta as a main ingredient, like lentils and pasta or a myriad of kugels. While we may associate spaghetti with Italian cuisine today, it has its roots in earlier civilizations and times.

One of the things I like about spaghetti is what its appearance on the plate teaches me about life. If you look at a plate of spaghetti, nothing is laid out in a clear distinct linear pattern. Rather, the noodles are interwoven, interacting with each other, and overlapping each other. The movement of one noodle affects the position of others. This plate of noodles reminds me so much of life. We are all like noodles, interwoven and intermingling on a plate. We may not always even realize we are somehow connected until a certain string of spaghetti is moved and we discover something shifting in our own lives.