coincidences and what not...

So, I'm reading The Joy Luck Club, by Amy Tan, as per suggested by my senior year English teacher, who remains one of my all time favorite teachers. She challenged us, inspired us, and, in all honesty, respected us, too. We just had a great time, while learning a WHOLE lot, too.

The book is really interesting. It's basically a very touching description of the relationships between mothers and daughters. The translational gap between the Chinese-native mothers, and their American born daughters, highlights the differneces that are inherently present between generations. Online, there was a question as to why there are so many "stories" used to make a point in this book. The obvious answer is that stories pave the way for expression when out-right declarations will fail, due to the implicit short-comings of human language. Stories paint pictures that a lecture won't. The truths in this story that--at first glance--might seem specific to the characters and relationships in this book, are actually a universal revelation on the way parents and children view each other, and communicate with each other. This book reminds me a great deal of the lessons I learned in reading "One True Thing", by Anna Quindlen. The entire book led up to the, rather profound notion that the way we view our parents is faulty. We see our parents, I see my parents in capture moments, like photographs, from my childhood. While these pictures are often times true, they are in no way the entire truth. My parents are whole beings, who led lives long before me, and who have experiences that I know nothing of. I'm given an almost completely inaccurate image of my parents because of the experiences I see as the whole.

Ok, so I don't know if this makes ANY sense at all, or if this is news to anyone else, but it really puts things into perspective for me to be reminded that there are so many sides to people, and that respecting, acknowleging, and trying to see those sides that might not be readily visable, are really important tasks.

Ok, that's all.

Oh, no wait...back to the title of this post...

I was reading the USA Today over some guys shoulder the other day, and I saw an article about Harriet Miers entitled, "Miers nomination suffered death by, 'a thousand cuts". It was notable because I had just read about the "death of a thousand cuts" in The Joy Luck Club. I love stuff like that.

Ok, thanks for reading...

Tommy