The afternoon was slowly fading into the evening and I had spent the entire day without the figure of my aspiration, my father. I paced impatiently on the floor in front of the door like a lurking cat waiting to pounce on its prey. The thought of wrestling with my father and hearing those words of affirmation: “You got me! Mercy! I give up!” it filled my head. My father was obviously faking it, but there was something in his words that has such power over a young boy's life. Mothers are a source of comfort and security for a boy, but it is the father who defines a boy's identity, the father gives him manhood. “A boy learns who he is and what he has gotten from a man, or the company of men. He can't learn it anywhere else. He can't learn it from other boys, and he can't learn it from the world of women. The plan from the beginning of time was for his father to lay the foundation of a young boy's heart...” (Eldredge 62) In the epic tale of the Odyssey young Telemachus went almost 20 years without his father. Odysseus, Telemachus' father, left for the Trojan War when Telemachus was just born. The Trojan War lasted 10 years, and on his journey home Odysseus faced a 10-year detour. Ulysses, the great king of Ithaca has been missing for 20 years and rumors of his death had reached the coasts of his kingdom. Suitors who had no intention of caring for Telemachus and Penelope (Odysseus' wife) but of amassing Odysseus' fortune began filling the halls of Odysseus' house in hopes of becoming the next king of Ithaca. Young Telemachus was helpless to defend the good name of his mother and father. Helpless because he didn't realize who he really was. His identity had not been revealed to him. If there was a time when Telemachus needed his father, it was then. He needed his father to protect his mother, defend the family name, and, more than anything, reveal Telemachus' identity. After all, who was Telemachus to face face to face the suitors who were tested in battle? With the help of Athena (goddess of war) Telemachus embarked on a journey to find his father, but more than just his father, he set out to find himself..