Character Analysis
The narrator's father plays even less of a role in the story than her mother does. He is basically just a source of fear for the ladies:
He would pound his hands on the table, rocking the sugar dish or spilling a cup of coffee and scream that if I didn't go to mass every Sunday to save my goddamn sinning soul, then I had no reason to go out of the house, period. Punto final. He would grab my arm and dig his nails into me to make sure I understood the importance of catechism. Did he make himself clear? (8)
Apá's rage comes out in his language and his actions, insisting to everyone else in the house that he's in charge. This is significant in terms of the narrator's sense of alienation from her immediate family— Apá doesn't exactly make things easy on the home front—but it also sets up another marker for the narrator's difference. While her mother and sisters fall in line, acting like the submissive people the narrator's family expects women to be, the narrator doesn't. This is another way that her strength is seen as unfeminine by her family—and another way in which she and Abuelita are birds of a feather.