In Cormac McCarthy's The Road, a dreary picture is painted where belonging is a rare thing. If you survived whatever event or series of events that occurred to create the wasteland that is presented, then usually, belonging is something that is as elusive to find as is survival. If you "belong," it is usually amongst two main groups: the barbaric cannibals that roam the country in hoards, looking for lone surivivors to kill, or, the groups of people that the father and the son witness locked up in an abandoned house, that are slowly being harvested for meat. It's pretty awful. There are also vague rumors of other groups of people, civilized people, that are surviving together, but they only hear about this through the old man, and only in a very guarded way. The son, adopted by the family at the end, might have found another place to belong also.
The father and the son are lucky, very lucky indeed to have each other. Because the other exists, they belong. As long as they have each other, they can fight through their existence. Belonging is a gift that they give each other every day of their lives. The father spends his days trying to teach his son how to survive in their world, how to belong in the eventuality that he might one day die. He hopes that his son can feel a sense of belonging in that world, even if he isn't around.
I hope that those thoughts helped a bit; good luck!
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