Importance of Family

Family, they are the most important thing anyone could have and some of the most influential people in your life. Your everyday life is shaped around them and they will always be there for you no matter what. Their function is simple, love each other, respect each other, and do anything you can to help each other if ever needed, no matter how big or small. Family is shown and discussed in two great pieces of literature, “Stone Soup” by Barbara Kingslover and A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith. “Stone Soup” talks about how there are many different types of families and it’s ok for them to be different than the steriotypical mom, dad, son, and daughter. And in A tree grows in brooklyn Betty Smith wrote about a family who was always there for eachother and showed what it is like to be a true family.

What is the importance of family? You could answer that question in a million different ways. “As long as I live, I will never have a woman for a friend. I will never trust any other woman again, except maybe mama and sometimes Aunt Evy and Aunt Sissy”(Smith, 238). I think this shows one reason why family is important, because even as this young girl says she will never trust one person from an entire gender ever again she still says how she will trust her family, which shows how family are always the ones you can trust no matter what. Another reason family is important because they help you through hard times and can stay strong for you, even if you can't. I also think family is important because it doesn’t have to be perfect “ to judge a family’s values by its tidy symmetry is to purchase a book by its cover”(kingslover,19). Families would be boring if they were all the same, there differences is what makes them special and important.

Families also have countless functions. Not just like how your mom is always there for you when you are sick or your brother is there for you when you need to laugh, family as a whole is always there for you when needed. ”His own cheering section of grown ups and kids all leap to their feet and hug each other, delirious with love for this boy. He’s andy, my best friends son. The cheering section includes his mother and her friends, his brother, his father and step-mother, a stepbrother and stepsister, and a grandparent.”(kingslover,1) . This is just one example of the function of a family, to be there to support your achievements, even if in the case of this family it may be difficult because of their past, they are strong for you. Family should also be there for you during your low days and mistakes. Another function of a family is to push and determine each other, for example when Neeley and Francie got a christmas tree together no one thought they could do it. But francie stood up for them and said “We’re not too little together”(smith, 202).And together they could do it and they won the christmas tree. There are many other family functions along with these.

So, overall my definition of family would be anyone who is always there for you loves you and supports you.Families are the most important people in you life and have the biggest function.