ding to Riri, (Pg. 22) with her grandfather. “…First father would go for a swim himself, leaving her in the shore. . . .After a while she would call to him, and he would turn and begin swimming shoreward, carving a line of foam. . . .cleaving the water ahead with the powerful propellers of his arms. He would come to her and lift her onto his back , where she clung, her arms looked around his neck, and go swimming out again. In an ecstasy of terror, she would hold to him , her soft cheek prickling where she had laid her face against the back of his neck, her legs and slender body trailing out behind her, moving effortlessly along in her father’s energetic wake.When Otto stubbed his little toe one day, and it turned black by the end of the day, Riri insisted that he see a doctor. The doctor informed the family that Otto did not have Lung Cancer, but instead an advanced stage of Diabetes that could have been controlled with insulin and a diet, had it been treated sooner. Otto died November 5, 1940. The children’s reaction to their father’s death was very different. Warren just explained that he was happy that his mother was young and healthy, where as Sylvia said “I will never speak to God again”. Sylvia insisted on going to school the next day as usual. However, when she arrived home after school, she handed her mother a note, which she asked her to sign, promising never to get married again. Riri decided not to take the children to the funeral because she felt that her husband looked more like a mannequin then himself, and she wanted to spare the children any further pain. This turned out to have been interpreted by Sylvia as indifference on her mother’s part. Riri also tried to be strong by not crying until the children were asleep at night and Sylvia in later writing very critically describes her mother at that time.In spite of her father’s death and the break out of World...
