This is a hackneyed topic of our discussions, but it is at the hub of the "downfall" of the family, but it is interesting to look at Mike Sr. and his own father...I mean, hadn't Mike Sr.'s own father banished him from his house, and didn't Mike Sr. resent and even hate his family for exiling him???...Then, he (Mike Sr.) goes and does it to his own daughter???...Didn't this man learn from his own father's harsh attitude???...Perhaps that is a point that Oates was trying to emphasize. Things, sometimes painful and aweful things, do serve a purpose whether we realize them to or not.