Snow Flower and the Secret Fan

I must admit that I may have been the only person this monday morning who was excited to go back to work. We kind of have a little family at the Doctors office. We are still a one car family right now so David had to drop me off and pick me up from work. It reminds me of the days when we were first married, prior to the purchase of our volvo. Don't worry, the volvo is just in the shop for a check up. Today when I got home from work I finished the book Snow Flower and the Secret Fan. It was a really sad story about a girl named Lily in nineteenth-century China who has to endure foot binding and an arranged marriage. What is so interesting about this story is that Lily is closer to her laotong or same old (friend) Snow Flower than she is her husband. When the ladies were in their thirties they ended up losing their life-long friendship over a misunderstanding. There were a lot of good lessons in this book. What I found to be thought-provoking was that Snow Flower wanted a friend who would sympathize with her while Lily thought it was most important to remind Snow Flower of tradition. Lily was as hard as a rock and regretted it the rest of her life. I don't want to ever be like that, but a good friend has to tell the truth. I wrestle with Snow Flower and Lily's style of friendship.