A New Life (Cathedral)

Fever

This short story is extremely sad, but at the same time the ending is very beautiful. Carlyle starts out the story being very weak and sad. His selfish wife leaves him for his colleague. She leaves him and the children. What kind of a mother could do such a thing? Leave your husband, but don’t leave your children. She’s an artist, and artists tend to have a stereotype to be crazy. She calls him every day, trying to cheer him up, but she ruined his life. She doesn’t realize how horrible she is for leaving her family behind. She calls to tell Carlyle how happy she is. It’s like as if rubs her happiness in his face. She is evil I do not like her. Although, I do think the problem in this relationship is that they fell in love to young. They were in college, she was 18 and he was 19. Many young marriages usually do not work out. There’s always one person who feels that they have missed out on a lot of their life.
“They need someone, you see. We need someone we can count on. I guess that’s our problem.” (p.170) For Carlyle and his children, their mother/wife has left them. They can get a descent babysitter to actually stay or that they like, and Carlyle just feels so sad and frustrated. Mrs. Webster is an angel for them. She comes into their lives making things better and easier for all of them. At the end she leaves, but she leaves and Carlyle becomes a stronger man being ready to let go of his past and just focus on his future and his children. Carlyle is a good person. I like this story a lot because I feel that it brings out a message that nobody should give up. You can be very weak, but in the end there is always a way to become stronger. You just have to try.