This weekend I finished reading The Sitting Swing which I liked very much. Here are some thoughts and reflection on the book:
Each one of us is shaped by our past – our strengths and our weaknesses, our likes and dislikes, our attitudes and our indifference toward life. This in turn impacts our present and future. Of course, there is a way to rewrite it all and to reprogram ourselves. In Irene Watson’s Memoir, The Sitting Swing, Irene searches for her identity and her purpose in life.
Her journey starts at a center for people with addiction and co-dependence and as she evolves for the next 28 days, the reader learns about her difficult childhood years, her strange controlling mother, her cool indifferent father and her extended family and cousins who mistreat her. Along the way, Irene makes a great friend named Margie who looks out for her, is supportive and helps her survive a life in a small community where everyone is in everyone’s business. Years later, as she loses touch with Margie, Irene meets yet another wonderful friend named Jean who helps her in her search to find herself. Ms. Watson learns that there is an entire world out there, different than the world she has known and different than the world she has envisioned.
What I enjoyed most about The Sitting Swing was that the writer wants to help readers see that they too can change their lives by asking the hard questions, who am I? What is it that I want? How has negative past events influenced me? And how can I make the small everyday changes in order to live a more fulfilled life. And although the story ends with references to “God” and “The Higher Power” which may not be palatable to those who are not religious, I still do believe that even they can benefit from this book by learning how to analyze their situation in life, by looking within and by being honest with their answers in order to figure out their own path.
I highly recommend The Sitting Swing. The story moves along smoothly, the characters are vivid and the plot interesting. Irene weaves her past and her present in a tale that is sure to touch everyone.
