Independent People by Halldor Laxness

HE made no further attempt to talk his son over; it is a mark of weakness to try to talk anyone over. An independent man thinks only of himself and lets others do as they please. He himself had never allowed anyone to talk him over. But from that day forward his son was gone as far as he was concerned. He no longer spoke to him, not even to give him his orders for the day, but setting to work with the labourer on a deep trench he intended digging in the marshes, he worked like a madman from dawn till dusk. The boy said nothing either, but the impending parting weighed on his mind with a sorrow mingled with apprehension, for the soil ran in his blood, without words, without ideas; and now he felt as if he were about to quit the soil and set off out into the atmosphere, out into the blue. But he could not help it No one can help it. One is a realist. One has put up with it all ever since childhood; one has had the courage to look it full in the eye, possibly courage enough to look it in the eye all one's life long. Then one day the distances beckon with their floating possibilities, and in one's hands are the admission tickets, two slips of blue paper. One is a realist no longer. One has finished putting up with it all, one no longer has the courage to look it in the eye, one is in the power of beckoning hospitable distances, floating possibilities, perhaps for ever afterwards. Perhaps one's life is over.

I'm off tomorrow," he said.