Pictures of Hollis Woods

      

It's nothing but a kid book. It's boring because the story is predictable. However, there is an inspirational part of the story that I realized during the book club discussion.
Sometimes what you see is so deep in your head you're not even sure of what you're seeing. But when it's down there on paper, and you look at it, really look, you'll see the way things are. 
Look at a picture one way and you'll see one thing. Look again and you might see something else. 

You see the same thing differently before and after you're in a particular situation. For example, songs are just songs. But the lyrics sound different when you break up with a boy/girlfriend. They sing your story.

Hollis Woods is the place where babies are abandoned. Hollis has been in many foster homes and what she really wishes is a family. But Hollis thinks she is a mountain of trouble and thus she doesn't deserve a family. After a car accident, she declines the warm offer to live together with the Regans though she's desperately in need of parents and a brother. Later she catches different things from a picture she drew. The message has always been there, but she didn't recognize it. Now she wants to get back together with the Regans.

Everyone has the same experience; you've looked at a painting and seen one thing, only to look again later and discover something different.

When I first looked at the calligraphy painting in my teens, it was just another masterpiece of Joseon Dynasty. When I looked again in my mid twenties, I could understand what the artist truly wanted to render through the desolate landscape.
I was struggling to build good relationships with people. People  that I had thought were trustworthy turned out to be unreliable. I was lost and confused.
The artist lost his enormous power and was banished in a remote island. Nobody came to see him but one follower. He realized who was a true friend or a fair-weather friend, and then represented the ideas with pine trees. Pines are evergreen and never change colors even when it's cold.

To Kill a Mocking Bird

The story is described by a little girl named Scout. Her father is an indefatigable defender of human rights and takes humanitarian efforts for innocent people like Tom Robinson and Boo Radley. She's well brought up with her father's educational remarks and lessons from an array of incidents that occurred in the neighborhood.

This is the best book I've ever read. I'm really fond of the main character, Atticus. Basically Atticus is humble and unprejudiced. He doesn't boast of his achievements (i.e. shooting skills). He is kind to unprivileged people including blacks and supports them wholeheartedly. More important, I like him as a good person and especially as an excellent father figure/educator.
Atticus never blames or looks down on the teacher who doesn't allow Scout to read at home. He suggests an alternative and prevents his daughter from thinking that school is a weird and unreliable place. Also he's kind enough to have Jem read stories to an elderly cranky lady until the day she dies. He knows that she has different views about things, but he wants his son to see what real courage is.
You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view. Most people are (real nice), Scout, when you finally see them. 
Atticus says in the trial that all men are not created equal in the sense some people would have us believe. Some people are smarter than others, some people have more opportunity because they're born with it. But he then says that it is a court that makes a pauper the equal of a Rockefeller or the stupid man the equal of an Einstein. Atticus knows the reality and what ordinary people normally think of. Nevertheless, he strives hard to persuade people, having a firm faith in man.
Atticus says if he doesn't defend Tom Robinson, he can't hold up his head in town. Most folks are entitled to full respect for their opinions. But before I can live with other folks I've got to live with myself. The one thing that doesn't abide by majority rule is a person's conscience. He doesn't want to let his kids down when they're grown and look back on the case.

Here is an insightful quote from the book. It's not necessary to tell all you know... folks don't like to have somebody around knowing more than they do. It aggravates them. You're not gonna change any of them by talking right, they've got to want to learn themselves, and when they don't want to learn there's nothing you can do but keep your mouth shut or talk their language. 
I had tried unsuccessfully to change my troubled students' attitude toward learning and life though they had their own pace and timing. I had to admit that I was not the person who was in their critical moment. Instead I'm happy and content if I can have a good influence on a handful of students a year.

The older I grow, the more content  I am with what I have. I used to want more, want better. I'm thankful for who I am and what I have. I've become optimistic about my life and I'll try hard to be a better person to understand people around me. I wasn't born as a suppressed slave in the feudal system. I'm not an uneducated woman who is influenced by extreme religious fundamentalists. I'm not surrounded by racial bigots. (There but for the grace of God go I.)