The bonds of our family relationship

 

Hi, this is Maxine reading the book “The Perks of Being A Wallflower.”

      Previously in this book, the main character called Charlie became more easygoing after meeting his neighbors, Sam and Patrick. He also mentioned his Aunt Helen, who treated him well but died from an accident a few years ago. In the last blog, I assumed that all of the characters had their own secrets since the author has revealed that Patrick is a homosexual. Guess what? I am right! In this reading section, he gave more details about what Aunt Helen had been through when she was alive. Also, the following secret was about his sister’s unexpected pregnancy.

 

     Aunt Helen was molested by a stranger when she was little. However, no one, even her parents, didn’t assist her. It resulted in her deviant behavior, including taking drugs and dropping out of school. She idled away for a long time until she found the right doctor to help her figure things out. Then, she moved into Charlie’s family and spent most of her time taking care of Charlie along with his siblings. Sadly, she died in a car accident because she wanted to buy Charlie a second gift as both his Christmas and birthday present. As for his sister’s pregnancy, it changed their relationship a lot since his sister relied on him for the first time. She cried out loud in his arms and asked him to cover this secret to taking her to get an abortion. That was also the first time that Charlie felt how close a family could be.

 

    Both of the two stories are related to family relationships, and they make me think of the differences we treat our family and friends. Actually, most of us tend to hang out with and feel more unrestrained when interacting with our friends. We neglect those friendly reminders from our parents since we have listened to them hundreds of times. However, when facing difficulties and not knowing what to do, all we tend to do is to count on our parents. They will attentively listen to our laments and tenderly comfort us. In fact, it is until we encounter those hardships that we discover that how important family members mean to us. Just as in Charlie’s story, he began to smoke in an attempt to escape from the sorrow for daily trivia. When his sister saw it, she said to him, “I love you so much, so I don’t want to see you smoke and hurt yourself.” Seeing this dialogue, I feel so touched that it is so authentic. Although using different ways to express their love toward us, our family members indeed care for us. They are the ones who will support us for good and never leave us alone to fight for hardship.

      After reading these chapters, I started to introspect the relationship between my parents and me.  I seemed to be mean to my mom because I always considered her words as nonsenses. Therefore, I never listen to her carefully and pay attention to what she likes or dislikes. Before college, what in my mind is to quickly run away from my parents and to live a life full of happiness and freedom. But now, I think it is time to make up for the crack between my mom and me, so I called her right after I finished reading these chapters. The first sentence was as usual, “Is everything alright for your college life.” Although I heard it more than 100 times, this time was quite different from the past since I knew the importance of family bonding. I said, “Of course, I still can handle it. Take good care of yourself, Mom.” In fact, I want to say “I love you” in the end, but it is hard for me since I am not that good at expressing love. Yet, I still make an improvement to tell my mom that I care about her and wish her health and happiness. Perhaps she secretly feels surprised at me saying such caring words. To sum up, I feel great after showing my love to my mom, and I truly appreciate what the book teaches me!