It also felt heartbreaking to watch Frank's father, Malachy, destroy himself and his family with his alcohol abuse and never being able to keep a job. When he did, he lost it because he would use all his money to get drunk on payday and miss half the day of work the next day (McCourt 145). It made me angry to watch Malachy let his family waste away so that he could wallow in his drunken pity to make the reality of his life not seem as harsh as it really was. The book had its humor also. An example of this is when Frank through up the body of Christ after he had received his first communion and his grandmother dragged him to the priest to confess his sins and what to do about "God in her backyard"(McCourt 129). Another example is when Frank's grandma gives him the task of delivering Bill Gavin's dinner, but instead of delivering it, he eats it and enjoys dearly (McCourt 136-137).
When I finished the book it showed that a person could come out of poverty to not only help himself but others as well and obtain his dream. Frank was able to support himself and help his family, probably once his father was out of his life, continually bring him further and further into poverty, the story of his life. Frank wasn't selfish in any part of the book. You can feel the intensity the moment Frank lays his eyes on America and how overpowering he feels. .
2. Frank and I have one thing in common throughout the book. Both our fathers were never there to support us. Frank's father left, keeping him thinking he was never to return, and not returning until Frank was in the peak of his teenage years. Malachy is kept in a downward spiral because of his unemployment. He remained drunk because he didn't have a job and he couldn't get a job drunk, so the cycle of poverty ran over and over again. He didn't even have the decency to stay out of the speakeasy on the day of Eugene's funeral. Moreover, he put his pint on his dead son's coffin.
