Cattle of the Sun

"Leave the beasts unharmed, your mind set on home, and you all may still reach Ithaca - bent with hardship, true - but harm them in any way, and I can see it now: your ship destroyed, your men destroyed as well! And even if you escape, you'll come home later, all shipmates lost, and come home a broken man"

- Circe, The Odyssey Book 12, Page 275

Circe has warned Odysseus of his fate, of what is awaiting him on his journey and yet he still perseveres. He shows incredible will and almost selfishness in his quest to get home in that he is willing to sacrifice his shipmates if it means he will arrive home to his family. It is sweet in a way, that his love for them is so strong, but he is doomed countless other families to a life without their husband or son or father. Circe's warning falls on deaf ears to an extent with the cattle being slaughtered by one of the shipmates in a fit of desperation. It just goes to show that things don't always go as planned and that what you strive for, what you want, can't always occur. Odysseus wants to go home, he wants to be with his family, but at every turn he is met with an obstacle of some form. His crew, the winds, the gods, the monsters, the sirens - the list never ends.