A Comparison of A Visit to Grandmother by William Melvin Kelley and My Father Sits in the Dark by Jerome Weidman

Family is group of persons closely related by blood. As children, parents raise and teach values and many important lessons of life to innocent youngsters. As adults, each individual still calls his or her family members when the individual had a bad day or needs someone to talk to. However, despite how close a family is, family members still encounter problems communicating with each other. For example, in both stories, "A Visit to Grandmother" by William Melvin Kelley and "My Father Sits in the Dark" by Jerome Weidman, the characters dealt with communication problems within their families. In the story, "A Visit to Grandmother," Chig and his father, Charles, decided to go back home to visit their family. When Chig and Charles arrived home, Charles' family was ecstatic to see him and they started reminiscing about the old times. During this visit, Charles realized how his lack of communication had caused him years of separation from his family. Additionally, in "My Father Sits in the Dark," the main character was curious about why his father often sat alone in the darkness staring at the corner. From this story, we can see how the father and son's relationship progressed. From my experiences, language and cultural differences can also destroy a family's relationship. Families may encounter many relationship problems due to a lack of communication.

A family will fall apart when family members do not converse with each other frequently. Nowadays, people are so occupied with their lives that people do not even have time to sit at the dinner table to enjoy a family dinner. People often feel that it is difficult to find time to spend with family members. For example, in the story "A Visit to Grandmother," Charles's mother failed to divide her time equally between her children. Charles felt unloved as his mother usually spent more time and energy on GL, Charles' brother. At the age of fifteen, Charles left his family because he thought "nobody loved [him]" (453).