Powder By Tobia Wolf Analysis

How to deal with family relationship can be a difficult issue especially the relationship between parents and their children. When neither parent nor child can understand the difference, some incidents suddenly happened that could help them to comprehend each other. This may be a symbol for fresh new beginning to make their relations be stronger once again. The short story “Powder”, by Tobia Wolf depicts a family of a father and mother who have some disagreements about how to educate their son. The father is characterized to be irresponsible and carefree when he teaches his son about life. In the story, the father takes his son on a skiing trip during Christmas Eve but he has a goal which is to make sure his son gets home on time for dinner. …show more content…
After the sawhorses are blocking the road and then the state trooper announced they should not go through, the father starts acting frustrating for a while about how he is unable to take his son back home on time. However, for the father to keep his promise, he is willing to take a shot rather than defeat by the bad situation, which leads him to break though the barricade to fulfill his promise. For the son, his father is reckless and leak of planning at this point but it looks like the only way that’s why he starts helping his father. This could be seen as stated by son “I got out and dragged one of the sawhorse aside, then pushed it back after he drove through. When I got inside the car he said, ' Now you're an accomplice. We go down together. '”(69) This quote shows that the son noticed that no matter how organized he is, something happened in life will like this snowstorm which he could never predict or planed before it's actually happened. That's also the turning point for the son's attitude towards his father. Much more, for the son, by contrast with his bold and seemingly fearless father, he realizes if he was more calm and relaxed like his father, he could have a better relationship with him. Towards the end, the son starts to calm down. This could be noticed when the son states, “I knew we’d get caught, I was resigned to it. And maybe for this reason I stopped moping and began to enjoy myself” (71). This description represents that the son's temper finally changes from being anxious and worried, and begins to enjoy himself. Also he admires his father's good driving skill, but be warned by his father not following his actions. The son realizes the action of his father is trying to keep the promise to his mom, and nothing will stagger him. It also shows that the boy finally begin to trust his dad. Therefore, the relationship between son and father has