“We learn from failure, not from success!”- Bram Stoker. In Gloria Watkin’s essay “keeping close to home,” the author reflects on her childhood and her education to see how she formed her values. She recalls that her parents have a major influence in shaping her identity. Her parents wanted her to be educated but at some time wanted her to be open-minded. They used books to both reward her and to punish her, giving them to her and taking them away. Even through her ideas of education were blurred in her childhood, as an adult she values and respect other people’s talents. Also, she learned from her father who was a janitor, to be more responsible and serious about her career as a writer. Although, I think Gloria Watkin’s is right that people
