In the work Ordinary People, what is your emotional reaction to the Jarrett family, specifically focusing on Conrad?

With Guest's work, I think that personal reflection is
going to be critical.  It is fairly applicable to everyone because the presence or
absence of a family is something that anyone can understand.  The fact that the novel
takes place within the emotional dynamics of a family is something on which nearly
everyone can and will have an opinion.  The most appropriate question then is how your
emotional reaction to what is going on would be?  Take some of the basic elements and
assess how you feel about it.  For example, the family deals with one major blow and
another that results from it.  What do you think about how the family dealt with Buck's
death?  They each have their own experience.  Connie doesn't understand it fully and
blames himself for it, which is why he tries to hurt himself.  Being the youngest,
Conrad is the one that manifests in the most demonstrative manner the pain the family
feels, but in this light, he also manifests how one must accept the scar and public
perception of disfigurement that might result and call out for help.  It is interesting
to see how the youngest one teaches the adults of the family this lesson.   Cal cannot
fully articulate the pain he is feeling because he has not fully grasped his own needs
nor does he fully understand how his past plays a role in the condition in which he is
in now in navigating the challenges between Beth and Con.  As for Beth, the harmony and
vision of perfection of life that was supposedly present before the trials that besieged
the family is something in which she took personal pride. For it to be gone is a
reflection of failure.  Is this an appropriate emotional reaction to death and the
forces of sadness and guilt that result from it.  The men in the family are ones that
have to undergo the acceptance of imperfection and emotional "messiness" in order to
better understand what it means to live in the modern predicament, while Beth, given her
own background, is fundamentally incapable of accepting such an emotional reality.  This
is not a judgment on her, as much as statement of how she appropriates reality.  I think
that being able to assess how you view these conditions might be a good starting point
on constructing your believes on the Jarrett family.