What was with Jesse's Dad huh?!?!

                        October6,2010                     Bridge to Terabithia,

                                                Jesse’s Relationship with Father

Jess’s relationship with his father, Mr. Aaron is typical of large families in many rural American towns. His father works far away from home so he is often gone for long periods of time. When he comes home the children are familiar to him but since they are growing and changing they are also unfamiliar to him. Jess is a 12 year old boy who is growing and changing and learning about himself. Jess does not have an older brother, he only has sisters. He has two older sister and two younger sisters. Jess’s father could have come from a similar family; where his father did not show any tenderness to his son. Mr. Aaron is not comfortable showing any weakness and he is uncomfortable with Jess’s artistic talents which he thinks will make Jess feminine.  He thinks that only girls should be “artsy” it is a feminine trait, undesirable in a boy, therefore he appears very harsh in his attitude to Jess.  Toward the end of the book we see that his father is not so hard after all, he really loves Jess and was devastated when he thought he had died along with his friend Leslie. He was not afraid to cry and show tenderness to Jesse who did not die but had been missing for a few hours.