you sat there counting stars,
And I wonder who was on your mind.
You sat there with the wind in your hair,
And I wonder whose face you caressed.
You sat there humming an old song,
And I wonder whose lips you kissed.

Was I ever in your heart?
Where did I ever reside?
Do you think of me,
Only when your nights are bare?

Like a ghost, you are always there but never really there.

Toni Morrison - Home

finished the book in one seating right after loaning it from the library. Morrison is a very visual kind of writer; the imageries that she created with her writing are sometimes shocking and vivid. I quite enjoyed her style. The novel Home is a relatively short one which revolved around the lives of a frank Money and his sister Cee. Frank and Cee came from an impoverished family in a rural town, Lotus, and grew up under the care of their evil step-grandma, Lenore and bummish grandfather Salem. Cee was despised by Lenore as she was borne on the streets and was regarded as a jinx but Cee was loved and protected by Frank. However when frank left to enlist in the army, Cee was left to her own devices and made the mistake of marrying Prince whom dumped her after leaving with Lenore's car to the city.
On another side of the world, frank suffered from PTSD after the war and took to drinking. Apart from Losing his two best friends from home, frank had a dark secret which he eventually revealed near the end of the book. Frank was on the way to self-destruction until he received a letter saying that his sister was dying and needed his rescue.
Cee had been working as a nurse for a nice doctor who eventually turned out to be Frankenstein of sort, drugging her and conducting experiments on her. Cee was on the brink of death until Frank appeared and both of them returned to the home they had abhorred in their youth. In lotus, the community spirit and love nursed Cee back to life. The ending was beautiful... the sense of losing something, finding it, and that peace of returning home.

Lost sleep over the week... school has barely started and I am all stressed out after realizing I have very little time left after scheduling in classes, work, thesis, revision... not to mention coming assignments, tests, projects. Kinda regret committing to 2 days/ week of work.

Finding it hard to concentrate on textbook reading, get distracted every 10min. Sigh... my life.

Sometimes I wish I could be the type to walk away from things and not feel guilty. people pulling u away to attend to other needs of theirs...I wonder how some pple can just turn a blind eye and not feel anything. I struggle so much with this.. on one hand I feel bad to not care on the other hand I feel bad that I'm not attending to the to-do list of my own...I then began to think why isn't so and so contributing help to those in the group who needed it? Why is it always the same few pple contributing? I began comparing and judging and felt disappointed that some pple could be uncaring enough to just shut themselves off.
But then this passage came to mind:

Peter was hurt that Jesus asked the question a third time. He said, “Lord, you know everything. You know that I love you.”

Jesus said, “Then feed my sheep.

18“I tell you the truth, when you were young, you were able to do as you liked; you dressed yourself and went wherever you wanted to go. But when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and others^f will dress you and take you where you don’t want to go.”19Jesus said this to let him know by what kind of death he would glorify God. Then Jesus told him, “Follow me.”

20Peter turned around and saw behind them the disciple Jesus loved—the one who had leaned over to Jesus during supper and asked, “Lord, who will betray you?” 21Peter asked Jesus, “What about him, Lord?”

22Jesus replied, “If I want him to remain alive until I return, what is that to you? As for you, follow me.” 23So the rumor spread among the community of believers^g that this disciple wouldn’t die. But that isn’t what Jesus said at all. He only said, “If I want him to remain alive until I return, what is that to you?”

Peter made the same human mistake of comparing the tasks "assigned" to him and that of John's. After Jesus told him to feed his sheeps and to follow him, Peter was more concerned about what John was supposed to do than anything else. Jesus then rebuked him and basically asked him to mind his own business and to just focus on what he had been asked to do- follow Jesus. 

Comparing our fates, our tasks, our shares of rewards, etc is oftentimes pointless and bring about bitterness, anger, jealousy... why do we do this? Because we want justice for ourselves? Because we want to get a fair share of things? Because we think we rightly deserve certain things ?