"for one more day?"

i reminded myself what a reading machine i can be by reading "for one more day" by mitch albom in one sitting. granted that the book is a short read, i read the whole book despite that i had more important things to do. (spoiler alert).

the book is an inspirational fiction novel about a man named charles "chick" benetto who forsook education to attmept to make big league baseball teams, but ended up not being good enough because of injury. his mother loved him greatly, but his father left the family at a very young age for very selfish reasons. charley's life after he quit baseball deteriorated drastically. he hated his boring sales job, and started drinking a lot. as a result, he started falling away from his family. his wife divorced him. his only daughter did not invite him to her wedding, because she was afraid he would embarass her. charley just couldn't take it anymore, and decided to commit suicide. through his several attempts, he was led back to his old home where his family grew up. he was absolutely astounded to find his mother, who had passed away 7 years ago from a heart attack. they recounted the events which showed his selfish motives to please his father through baseball, but also the mother's unfailing love for her son, and her spirit's eventual inspiration for his son to keep living. of course, he does, because he loves his mother.

the model of the heartfelt story.

so i have discovered that around 3 months is the time that i start getting very agitated and impatient when i am home. i think that this is approximately when i run out of patience with my family. today i had lunch with my mom and my cousin, and when i was driving him home after i dropped off my mom, i was once again commended for living with not ONE, not TWO, but THREE post menopausal chinese women. i have observed that 95% of the things they say to me involve either them commanding me to do something, or commanding me not to do something or what i am doing is not right. each nagging me in their own sort of way. i can only take so much of.. telling me what to eat by watching what i eat as if i don't know how to eat, criticizing me about job hunting, criticizing that i am wasting my time and my choices for the future are poor, cleaning up my stuff and reorganizing my stuff when i didn't ask them too and then feeling their contempt and only result in me having to find my own stuff again because they put it somewhere else, their tones of disrespect, all their crazy and menial food restrictions, staying away from the computer restrictions, don't do this don't do that, yelling for 20 minutes about nothing when i show a bit of attitude.

sometimes on days like that, i get this feeling in my heart like there is a heavy weight on it, and the heart muscle has to support that heavy weight. and it's so heavy that i can't support any other system of the body. or it's like something is squeezing your heart and it has to push against the squeezing just to beat. and even when their nagging stops, that feeling is still there, and it sometimes carries over the next day. like i would wake up, and that would be the first thing i feel.

it really is hard to read the book and try to learn the same lesson as chick benetto did. from all human standpoints, is it fair to learn that lesson? does anyone have the supernatural patience to deal with all that? sometimes the only words that i can say is.. unbelievable.

tonight i had that heavy heart feeling again because of lunch, and then i got an idea. what if i nagged them back the same way that they nagged me, each in their own ways? i wonder how they would take it, sounds like a fun activity haha.