Carrie lives in an upper middle class neighborhood in a family concerned with appearances and with maintaining the illusion of stability. Carrie feels anything but stable, and the pressure she feels to conform adds to her feelings of isolation. Oneal places Carrie in an affluent community, an ordered household, and an environment where people place social skills and the ability to conform to middle-class conventions above intellectual skills and the freedom to express creativity. Oneal contrasts Carrie's ordered life with the confusion in her mind. She feels out of place in the world, and believes that such pressures did not exist in Hyde Park, the neighborhood where Carrie believed she had a carefree childhood.

Change can be frightening for all of us.

Carrie seems to have had a difficult time dealing with her move from Hyde Park.

Her fear of change increased after her move, and then spun...