In chapter two, Holden reveals some of his most important traits through his interaction with Mr. Spencer. In this scene, it is the first time you see Holden communicating with someone, but even in the beginning, he is apathetic the lesson Mr. Spencer is trying to teach him. However, although he looks at someone like Mr. Spencer negatively, he justifies his or her imperfections and keeps from disliking someone too strongly. Unfortunately, Holden does the same to himself as he does to others. He cannot decide who he is and it reveals itself when he cannot relate others. Communicating is Holden's major flaw and Mr. Spencer points it out.
             In the scene with Mr. Spencer Holden said that he thinks about old Spencer a lot. Holden looks down on old Spencer because he views Spencer as living a sorry existence. He mentions that Spencer spends most of his time sick in bed and is so useless that he needs someone to pick up his chalk when he drops it. He explains that he does not know why old Spencer is even living. Holden says, "I just mean that I used to think about old Spencer a lot, and if you thought about him too much, you wondered what the heck he was still living for." Holden looked negatively upon Spencer, but as Holden does frequently later in the book, Holden justifies old Spencer's life. "That's awful in my opinion. But if you thought about him just enough and not too much, you could figure out that he wasn't too bad for himself." Holden therefore looks at both the negative and positive sides of a person. He does the same to sally. He repeats that "she's phony as hell" and gives him a "pain in the ass" but he tells her that she is the only reason he stays in New York. He wanted her to run off to the forest with him. Holden also dislikes the way that Luce is such a big hot shot, but he never hates him because Holden thinks he is o
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