I've been doing some reading

I've been a little slack on blogging, but I promise it is only because I've been doing a lot of reading.  It is interesting how the books I read tend to have overlapping themes even though I don't intentionally choose them that way.  In the last two weeks, I've read Barack Obama's Audacity of Hope, Letters from Young Activists, and Snow Falling on Cedars.  The thing that struck me in all three books was the idea that if we all cared a little more about others than we care about ourselves, then the world would be a better place.  If that is too hard, then maybe we could all work on being a little more empathetic towards each other.

It took me forever to read Obama's book.  It wasn't that the book was bad.  It was kind of like reading a brief history of the United States.  I like history, so this wasn't a problem for me.  While I was reading the book, I kept wondering to myself why he picked the title. The book didn't seem that hopeful to me - quite the opposite.  It left me wondering how we as a nation have moved so far from our founding ideals and wondering if we could ever get close to the ideals that we espouse.

The Letters from Young Activists  was an interesting read.  In general, I think I have pretty liberal views.  However, after finishing this book, I look downright conservative in my views and opinions.  The book was filled with letters written by activists under age 30.  They wrote about the prison industrial complex, the imperialistic nature of the United States, and the oppression of various groups within the United States.  Although I wouldn't say that I agreed 100% with all the letters, reading the book did expand my thinking on various ideas.  In my opinion, this is what good reading is all about - expanding your mind and viewing the world from a new perspective.

Snow Falling on Cedars is a fiction book about that is set around World War II in an island off the coast of Washington.  The story centers around a murder trial and as the story unfolds you learn about a lot of different people who live on the island.  One focus was on the Japanese internment during World War II.  I was really heartbroken reading the stories - even though this was fiction.  I was reminded how little I heard about this during history classes.  It seems like this part of our history was just a footnote in the textbooks.  If we didn't gloss over the harder parts of our past maybe we could move a little farther in our present.