I tried to make my weekly book delivery to my Amish neighbors and their children Sunday, but I lost track of what day it is, it is a day of worship for them, not commerce.

I went back late this morning with a dozen carefully selected books for the girls in the family. The books I’ve ordered for the boys are coming in a day or so.

I found Barbara sitting by the road stand selling pies, cookies, and bread. She told me her parents and the other children loved the books I dropped off earlier in the week.

I bought an Apple Pie for $8 and a bar of soap for $4. Barbara had to the run-up to the farmhouse to get change, so I drove up to meet her up there.

I visited the horses and admire the biggest clothesline I think I’ve ever seen. The first two rounds of books are a hit, so I know what to get now. I told them I’ll make my weekly visits.

There were five or six carriages lined up across from the farmhouse, and piles of freshly cut logs. My sense was that the farm produces wood for carriages and firewood. They are planning to put up a shed to sell the baked goods they make.

And there was the longest clothesline I’ve ever seen. I can’t imagine how they washed so many clothes.

I didn’t stay long.

I brought The First Four Years, by Laura Ingalls Wilder, Little Amish Lizzie by Linda Byle (The Buggy Spoke Series), Plain and Simple; A Woman’s Journey To The Amish; Life with Lilly; the adventures of Lilly Lapp by Mary Ann Kinsinger and Suzanne Woods Fisher, and for the older girls or adults, Summer Hill Secrets, by Beverly Lewis.

I’ve got the Hardy Boys and LM Montgomery books on the way. These kids are very avid and enthusiastic readers. They asked me if I was the man who dropped off some other books and left them on the chair next to the baked goods.

Yes, I said, that was me. I’m very happy these books are being loved so enthusiastically. Tomorrow, I’m visiting a second farm with books for them. I’m on track now, I know what they like to read, and I know what it’s okay to give them.

Last night, leafing through one of the many books about the Amish I’ve been browsing through, I came across a Harvard School of Medicine study that found that the Amish people have a much lower rate of heart disease than most Americans.

The study also found that major depression occurs about one-fifth to one-tenth as often among people in the Old Amish order as it does in the rest of the U.S. population.

As someone with heart disease, this doesn’t surprise me.

It’s a wonder half of the people in American or half the people who go online don’t have heart attacks constantly. Amish families don’t watch the news, that alone should prolong life.

My new neighbors work from dawn to dark, hitch and brush horses and ride back and forth all day, eat healthy foods, have no computer or information devices, and reverer family and community.

There are kindness and gentleness about them which borders on the surreal in our hyper-rude and distracted culture. Their children are lean and busy.

I’m increasingly comfortable visiting these families, and they seem to be increasingly comfortable with me. My idea is to take it slow and easy, and I’ll be making weekly book visits from now on.

I do feel a strong connection with these families, I’m eager to see where it will go. I drove by their farm later in the day and I saw one of the sisters sitting on the grass behind their food stand reading one of the books I had brought earlier. What a nice sight.