In The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, It says this about family: All the members of a household; those who share ones domestic home. But is that really all it is? Reading these books made me dig a little bit deeper.

The first book I read was Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech. According to this book, my definition of family would probably sound more like: A group of people who love and care for one another. Though Phoebe and Salamanca aren’t blood related, they love and care for each other. And even though Salamanca, her father, Gram, and Gramps don’t all live together, they most certainly love and care for each other. On their trip, Gram, Gramps, and Sal interact with each other through Phoebe’s story. They love each other terribly, and all want the other to be content, though sometimes- as does happen with all families- they get in each other’s way. On their journey to Idaho, Gram and Gramps want to stop places and see things, while Sal is determined to get to their destination by her mother’s birthday. As the trio not only travels through the states but through Phoebe’s story, it seems that it is the tale that helps Salamanca learn to accept everything, and grow stronger as a person. Sal is hearing the trees sing again. Life unravels itself slowly, and this family is brought closer together than ever before.

The Outsiders, by S.E. Hinton tells the story of a group of boys, a gang actually, who, by a different definition, are family. “‘Dally’s okay,’ Johnny said defensively, and I nodded. You take up for your buddies, no matter what they do.” Though the gang doesn’t necessarily all love each other, they stick up for each other, look out for one another, and if someone gets hurt, they care for the other. Darry, who’s always looking out for Ponyboy, sometimes sets some rules (curfew, places not to go, people not to hang out with) that don’t exactly work out with what Ponyboy wants to do. As Ponyboy is growing up, things are happening: Darry gets too mad to control, Ponyboy and Johnny run away, Johnny kills a Soc, etc. Too much is happening to keep up with. And like a knot in curly hair, things are avoided and untouched for so long, too long perhaps, that those things get out of hand, and before you know it has taken over your whole head, and you do the only thing left there is to do: you cut it. Everyone starts a new beginning, and they make excuses about why their hair got so tangled in the first place. Slowly but surely though, they realize that it doesn’t matter how it happened, or how it got there, reality is still the same. The hair is gone, and it is time to move on, and stay gold.