feel happy is delivering coal for Mr. Hannon because he feels like a family man that brings home the money. His ability to find good job makes him able to fulfil
his physiological needs. Here, he is able to fulfill his needs for food, liquid and shelter.
b. Giving a Better Life to His Family
Frank has succeeded in fulfilling his physiological needs. Then, he wants to be able to support his family and fulfil the self-esteem needs both for him and for
his family. This condition involves the needs for both self-esteem and for the esteem a person gets from others. A person has a need for a stable, firmly based,
high level or self-respect and respect from others Maslow 42. In the novel, Frank wants to give a better life to his family and to support the family. He also wants
other people to treat his family as equals like other Limerick people. If he can support his family then he will be able to give a better life for the family too.
Frank’s job to read books for Mr. Timoney is a joy for Angela, because from that job Frank earns sixpence and at the same time he also earns money from
selling the “Limerick Leader” with uncle Pat. He gives me sixpence, and tells me to return next Saturday. Mam is
delighted I earn sixpence from reading to Mr. Timoney 198.
Angela is delighted with the fact that Frank has two jobs and he is able to earn some money to help the family, but she also feels sad when she knows that
Frank looses all his jobs at once. Because it means that there is no more money to buy some food except from the docket that they get from St. Vincent de Paul
Society.
Mam says, What’s up with you? Why are you moping? And I tell her how uncle Pat doesn’t want me anymore and how the put Mr. Timoney to the
City Home. Then she says, Ah, I’m sorry and it’s a pity you lost two jobs 202.
After he looses his two jobs where it means that he cannot help his mother,
Frank finally gets another job. Mr. Hannon, his neighbour needs him to help deliver the coal around Limerick because he has bad legs like uncle Pat. From this
job he earns sixpence and he is happy to give the money to his mother and feels like a man that is able to bring the money for the family. He enjoys his job though
it then almost ruins his eyes. Mr. Hannon buys me a lemonade, gives me the shilling for my morning’s
work and tells me I can go home now. On the way home I see myself in the glass of a shop window all black from the cool and I feel like a man with a
shilling in my pocket. Mam is sleeping up in Italy with Alphie and there’s a coat over the window
to keep the room dark. I tell her I earned a shilling and she says I can go to the Lyric, I deserve it. Take the tuppence and leave the rest of the shilling
on the mantelpiece downstairs so that she can sent out for a loaf of bread for the tea 302.
Frank is very fortune; because of the kindness of Father Cowpar he can get a job as a telegram boy. Though it’s a temporary job, he can earn a pound a week.
He then tries to save some of his money to go to America and tries to help his family. With his first pound, he buys Michael a dinner and asks him to go to the
cinema. He is finally able to make his brother happy. Michael is across the street calling me. He’s hungry and wonders if there’s
a chance he could go to the Abbot’s for a bit of bread and stay there for night instead of going all the way to Laman Griffin’s. I tell him he doesn’t
have to worry about a bit of bread. We’ll go to the Coliseum Café and have fish and chips, all he wants, lemonade galore, and then we’ll go to see
“Yankee Doodle Dandy”
with James Cagney and eat two big bars of chocolate 367.
Since Frank lives in Grandma’s house with uncle Pat, his brother Michael
says that he wants to stay with Frank. Uncle Pat pays the rent but Frank buys the food since his mother and his youngest brother Alphie choose to stay with him
rather than with Laman Griffin. There Frank gives his wages from working as a telegram boy to his mother so that Angela can buy some food for the family.
Sometimes Angela lets Frank keep two shillings though it means Frank cannot always save the money if he then chooses to go to see a movie or buys a second-
hand book. Mam gets the relief and food dockets till someone informs on her and she’s
cut off from the Dispensary. Now I have to hand over my wages. Some weeks she lets me keep two shillings but if I go to a film or buy a second-
hand book there’s nothing left, I wont be able to save for my fare 373-74. Angela feels sad when she knows that Frank chooses to quit the job as the
telegram boy and works for Easons company to be a messenger boy but she does not mind since Frank always bring his wages home. One day Frank brings home a
big supper for the family and Angela does not know where he gets the money to buy the big supper. Angela does not know that Frank is selling the banned article
about birth control from a tabloid with high price that makes him able to earn more than ten pounds.
I put the eight pounds in the post office for my fare to America and that night we have a big supper of ham, tomatoes, bread, butter, jam. Mam
wants to know if I won the sweepstakes and I tell her people gives me tips. She’s not happy I’m a messenger boy because that’s the lowest you can
drop in Limerick but if it brings in ham like this we should light a candle in gratitude 411.
From the money that Frank earns he can support his mother and his three
brothers and they have their own shelter in grandma’s house with uncle Pat. He also can give a better life for the family than his father can give. Malachy Jr. has
his own job, his brothers Michael and Alphie now can go to school and his mother
Angela is now taking care of someone. The family is able to enjoy and feel the happiness of life because of Frank’s struggles.
Malachy has his own job in the Stockroom of a garage handing out parts to mechanics and Mam herself is taking care of an old man, Mr. Sliney out in
the South Circular Road 412. It can be concluded that Frank is able to fulfil his self-esteem need. He is
able to support the family and give the family a better life from the wages that he earns rather than the life that his father ever give for the family. Though the way he
gets the money is wrong by selling a banned article. He even does not feel disturbed when his mother gets cut off from the Dispensary and never gets relief or
dockets anymore. Maslow 42 states, that if the self-esteem needs are satisfied, the person feels self confident and valuable as a person in the world. Frank feels
confident because finally he becomes the family man since he already takes that burden since his father often abandons the family. He feels confident too because
he can give enough food for the family, and no more stale bread or tea for their supper. He also feels confident because he can save an amount of money for his
fare to go to America to pursue his dream to have an even better life for himself.
c. Going to America
