Exodus Lit Circle

I missed the day where our class discusses the main themes of Exodus, but here are my own thoughts:

Orleanna:
-"As long as i kept moving, my grief streamed out behind me like a swimmer's long hair in water" (381).
-"A mother's body remembers her babies--the folds of soft flesh, the softly furred scalp against her nose. Each child has its own entreaties to body and soul. It's the last one, though, that overtakes you. I can't dare say I loved the others less..." (381).
-"I wonder what you'll name my sin: Complicity? Loyalty? Stupefaction? How can you tell the difference? Is my sin a failure of virtue, or of competence?"(383).

Orleanna is immersed in deep guilt, unable to function unless she is in constant movement.


THEMES/RECURRING IDEAS:

-In Exodus, we see mainly how the Price women deal with their own personal guilt. Leah feels obligated to help the Congolese fight for justice, Rachel feels like she doesn't need to feel guilty about what happened, Adah puts her heart into helping others by her medical skills, and Orleanna takes up gardening to try to keep moving.
-Another idea in this chapter is forgiveness. Now that the Price women are imformed of Nathan's death, will they forgive him? Leah seems to be the most forgiving. She seems to still love him and just thinks that he is stupid and wishes he could have redeemed himself. She cries over him and pities him. All the other charaters seem to be able to erase him from their thoughts. Orleanna remarks about if they are allowed to remember what happened in the Congo.
-Now that Adah is fixed from her handicap, she loses the ability to read backward and think the way she used to. Adah remarks about how she liked her handicap and misses it.
-Rachel has gotten very successful in the Equatorial and she feels finally superior to her sisters. All her life, she felt that she was always inferior because her sisters were "gifted." She remarks about how she hates how none of her family members ever visit her.
-Rachel always shows racism. She talks about how it is so strange how Leah married a black man. She said it wasn't normal. This book not only shows sexism, but also racism.