Leota's Garden




I finally read a book for leisure, not for an exam or a legal opinion. My life is not so busy after all. I realized I just had to take it with me everywhere and I went and I noticed the opportunities to read presented itself. OK so I must confess, it did take a few months to finish. What? I'm a busy person. I didn't plan to read it for so long obviously, but there was just never time to pick it up, even when I carried it around in my bag everyday despite its weight. When you try reading it at the salon, the stylist would ask you to hold your head up, when you settle in to read it at home, you get a call or a knock at the door that just distracts you.

Excuses aside, I finally finished Leota’s Garden by Francine Rivers. (Big Grin). I've been done reading this 425 paged book for about a month now but I suddenly find myself missing Leota Reinhardt and her granddaughter. I was quite sad that her daughter did not have the opportunity to make amends in person and I was just so mad at the hospital worker who thought he was doing Leota a favour. I was so drawn into the book I think I became a character myself. Sometimes I even took sides.

Love, forgiveness, self-denial and all those little angry emotions we take for granted and nurse.  It’s amazing how we can unconsciously entertain some animosity towards members of our own family and let it affect our choices even in their dying years. I saw family through the eyes of an old woman. The things she would have loved to say, but just wouldn't say for the sake of peace, living alone, and surviving on social security. I saw sacrifice through the eyes of her sweet grand daughter who somehow was sweet enough to be there for a grandmother she had barely known growing up. I saw animosity through the eyes of a daughter who thought she had every reason to stay mad at her mum even when she was ageing and needed people around her.

I don’t want to be a spoiler for anyone who hasn't read Leota’s Garden, so I'm just going to recommend it as a worthy read for anyone looking for a book to read for leisure. It might start off slowly, and you may wonder where the story is headed. Perhaps that accounted for my protracted read of the book. But trust me it’s one of those books you finish reading with a ‘hmmmm’, a smile on your face and a gentle close of the book.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Food-Xperiments

Image
Recently, I have been trying my hands out on some food -Xperiments, been reading Food Blogs like the dailies and been discovering some amazing food secrets like the Sesame Seed Oil (thanks to my food network watching cousin)!!! I'm not a big eater, in fact I can be perfectly defined as "the lady that does not eat" I get comments like "that's why you're not fat" "when you won't eat" "you need to eat" yada yada yada. I tell anyone who cares to listen, food is not the reason I'm not fat. In fact, while I may not be a big a eater, the composition of my tiny meals will send any one with fat genes to the gym. I love any meal that comes with colour and has an aroma that has me sniffing around. So I basically try to turn everyday meals into something with an aroma and color or a different shape. Sometimes, I stand at the door to my refrigerator and just keep staring. My financial industry work has me staring at every food
Read more

Dear DSTV,

Image
DSTV Seems to have touched nerves this season. Below is an open letter to DSTV by an angry customer. I laughed hard when this was sent to me by Mistah Cole. Image courtes y  teeveetee.blogspot.com Dear DSTV, "I am writing this letter to you,  Multichoice/DStv , as a client of yours who has been with the company since the 90's when it was still known and referred to as  Multichoice , and i have to say- this is an ALL time low for you guys as you are now obviously out of content despite your exorbitant rates. Some few months ago, you increased the fees for bouquets and also "added" some new scam stations which would normally have pacified people. However this was not to be the case as the repetition of content only increased. For some weeks now a number of movies have been on heavy rotation. Examples of such movies are Jackie Chan's THUNDERBOLT, DIE ANOTHER DAY,  TOMORROW  NEVER DIES and all the other James Bond movies (Except CASINO ROYALE, QUAN
Read more

Med-View Airline and its Foreign Cabin Crew!

Image
I’ve been accused of blogging once in a 'pink' moon, so here’s one for the New Year! (image courtesy www. travelscopeng.com ) From my corner at the waiting lounge of the Nnamdi Azikiwe Airport in Abuja, I keep staring at the Med-View Plane that had just arrived from Lagos. My mind tries to process why the plane has the EU logo and that of another country imprinted on it. I try even harder to recall what the Med-view logo actually is; the blue wavy stripes at the tail of the plane do not seem the least bit familiar! Perhaps Med-View has commenced flights outside Nigeria, I conclude. Soon enough my flight to Lagos was announced. We go through the normal security process and that’s when I see the first one. At the door of the aircraft is a Portuguese young man to tell you where your seat is. I have never quite made sense of the need for direction on a local flight. How much help is ‘your seat is to the right’? And while I’m at it, I have also never made sense of
Read more