Outsiders Essay #2

I just finished reding the book the Outsiders and I noticed how the main character in this book, Ponyboy really grew up from the beginning of the book to the end of this book. I think a major part of Ponyboy's coming of age was his family. I think that because of family issues Ponyboy had to take on more responsibilities and be more mature.

In the beginning of the book Ponyboy seemed like he really depended on his brothers for a lot of things. Darry was supposed to give him food and and kind of let Ponyboy know what the rules are. Ponyboy depended on his other brother, Soda for support and friendship. He didn't do many things without having at least one of his brothers with him. At the beginning of the book they were like Ponyboy's parents.(his parents had passed away in a car accident.)

Towards the end of the book after friends passed away and endless fighting with each other, the family became closer to each other. Ponyboy realized that his brothers also had proplems, it wasn't just him. He started to help his brothers with their problems as well as his own. He also learned how to be by himself and do things on his own. As Ponyboy became more mature he seemed to get less afraid. This is the opposite for a lot of people. For some people the more they know, the more afraid they are. By the end of the book, I think that Ponyboy became a more kind and caring type of person.

I think that family always will play an important part in every kids life. When family members are fighting, to a kid it seems like the end of the world and you realize how bad things can be. When everything gets fixed and there's no fighting in the family you kind of appreciate it, even though it's nothing special. I think that this is kind of what happened to Ponyboy. Events like family issues make people grow or come of age because they have to take on more responsibilities to help solve the problems that they're going through during that time.

To sum this up, what I'm tyring to say is that family is a very important part of everybody's life so its not really a surprise that family plays a big part in growing up. This happened to Ponyboy and it probably happens to people in real life too.