StrangersGrowing up, I never had what was considered to be a good relationship with my father. He was never mean or violent; he just seemed indifferent to my existence. Shell-shocked from the war, he had become a fiercely private man who rarely spoke to anyone. Most of the time he failed to notice that I was around. This led, throughout my teenage years, to me avoiding him. To say we were not close is an understatement. We were strangers bound by blood.Of course I tried in the early days, like every young boy does, to get his attention, but it was to no avail. I attempted to be the good son, doing housework and running errands, and when that didn’t work I tried my hand at being the bad son, being insolent and untidy even though it was not in my nature. My behaviour made no difference. His response was always the same – a quizzical look cast over the rim of his glasses, first at me and then at my mother, urging her to administer praise or reprimand me as she herself saw appropriate. Then his eyes went back to his book as if they somehow felt uncomfortable being out in the real world.By the time I was thirteen I had given up hope of him ever connecting with me. I won a prize at school for science and I wanted him to tell me that he was proud of me. The congratulations never came. That was when I stopped speaking to him. I made a decision on that day to ask him no more questions, to make no more comments, and to only speak to him if and when I was spoken to. He never instigated exchanges, and so my stubbornness led us into silence.I skirted around the house steering clear of him, making an effort to not be in the same room as him. Mealtimes led me to become more and more creative with my excuses. Whether my father knew of my strategy, I don't know. Perhaps he was oblivious. But it was a peace that I eventually grew accustomed to, and I actually started to prefer it that way. We were two individuals waiting on a train platform, aware that the other was there but choosing not to engage.I left home at sixteen without saying goodbye. My father was reading and I chose not to disturb him. I didn't see him again until my wedding day many years later. It was my mother who had invited him. I expected him to say nothing, and that's exactly what happened. But when he looked at me over the rim of his glasses I thought I saw the very beginnings of a tear. Question promptAccording to the text, what was the reason for the father’s behaviour towards his son?Question response areaSelect one optionthe son’s insolent behaviourthe father’s experiences as a soldierthe son’s lack of interest in reading booksthe father’s desire to maintain a level of privacyNext

In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I've been turning over in my mind ever since."Whenever you feel like criticizing any one," he told me, "just remember that all the people in this world haven't had the advantages that you've had."He didn't say any more but we've always been unusually communicative in a reserved way, and I understood that he meant a great deal more than that. In consequence I'm inclined to reserve all judgments, a habit that has opened up many curious natures to me and also made me the victim of not a few veteran bores. The abnormal mind is quick to detect and attach itself to this quality when it appears in a normal person, and so it came about that in college I was unjustly accused of being a politician, because I was privy to the secret griefs of wild, unknown men. Most of the confidences were unsought—frequently I have feigned sleep, preoccupation, or a hostile levity when I realized by some unmistakable sign that an intimate revelation was quivering on the horizon—for the intimate revelations of young men or at least the terms in which they express them are usually plagiaristic and marred by obvious suppressions. Reserving judgments is a matter of infinite hope. I am still a little afraid of missing something if I forget that, as my father snobbishly suggested, and I snobbishly repeat, a sense of the fundamental decencies is parcelled out unequally at birth.

Did you feel secure and comfortable sharing your thoughts and emotions with this person? How did this impact your level of openness and vulnerability?

Which of the following lines taken from The Wide, Wide World BEST exemplifies the theme of women's relationships?"No, my daughter, I'll not send you alone. But your father says it is impossible for him to take the journey at present, and it is yet more impossible for me. There is no help for it, daughter, but we must entrust you to the care of some friend going that way; but He that holds the winds and waters in the hollow of his hand can take care of you without any of our help, and it is to his keeping above all, that I shall commit you.""You know the way to make him so, Ellen. He is willing; it only rests with you.""That's no matter, daughter; they will be just as good when they do get to me. Never think of that; write every day, and all manner of things that concern you,—– just as particularly as if you were speaking to me.""Oh, many things, said her mother, you will see. But now, Ellen, if there is anything you wish to talk to me about, any question you want to ask, anything you would like particularly to have, or to have done for you, I want you to tell it me as soon as possible, now while we can attend to it, for by and by perhaps we shall be hurried."

Now consider if the story were written from the father's (first person) perspective. How could you construct the narrative to bring out the father's position and his feelings on the issue?

If one does not establish an intimate relationship in young adulthood, will the result end in one feeling a sense of isolation as Erikson proposed (why or why not)?