A Good Man Is Hard To Find

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A GOOD MAN IS HARD TO FIND.

In this story, we find a grandmother who lived with her only boy named Bailey. This

grandmother has no interest in going to Florida but to Tennessee. The woman sees the danger

associated with her visiting Florida as this is the direction that The Misfit, a criminal from

Federal Pen, headed. She gives a newspaper to her son to read on what The Misfit did to people

of Florida. It is amusing that her son ignores her and goes on reading about sports in a Journal he

had. She then turns to children’s mother and tells her that she needs to take the children to

another place they have never been apart from Florida, and she proposes East of Tennessee.

However, the children are not happy to go to Tennessee as they tell her to stay at home she did

not want to go to Florida. Taking her children towards any direction to which was a criminal

character, as The Misfit, would mean going against her conscience. It is ironical that despite the

fact that she has fears about The Misfit, the direction she chooses to take her family for a tour, it

is along it that they meet him. The Misfit, with other two men, arrive at their scene of an accident

and act mercilessly to them. The pleas made by the grandmother not to shoot them are all in vain,

as The Misfit orders his fellows to kill the rest and he finally shoots the grandmother. (Kilcourse,

G. 2001).

The journey to Tennessee started early the following day. The grandmother felt it was

going to be a good day for driving, little did she know it was her day to meet her death. She was

the first person to get into the car for the journey. In this journey, she carried along her Pitty Sing

hid in a basket fixed under her big black valise. The rest, Bailey and the mother of June Star and

John Wesley and her children, got prepared to set off for the journey. Bailey, the driver,

however, did not like the cat to get to the motel with him. In the car, the grandmother sat in

between John Wesley and June Star at the back seats while the children’s mother together with

her baby sat in front. The children’s mother is on slacks and on her head is a green head-kerchief,

which has two points making it look as if it were rabbit’s ears. The grandmother was on a navy

blue sailor hat, navy blue dress and on her neck is a well-designed purple decoration. She is

dressed to look like a woman even in a scene of an accident. This description by the narrator was

an explication of what was to happen while in their journey to Tennessee. (Kilcourse, G. 2001).

The little John Wesley proposed that they go through Georgia for their adventure not to

gaze at it all time. However, the old woman argued that Tennessee had mountains as opposed to

Georgia, which had on hills. Who knows whether if they changed route their lives could be safe?

It is undebatable that the grandmother was too fixed to arriving at Tennessee but, something

lousy seemingly made her not to heed to either of the little children's quest. As they drove, they

watched many sceneries along the journey. They observed a Negro child at shack's door, for

instance, a cotton plantation with several graves in the middle whose occupants had died. The

grandmother shows this to the little children with laughter as she tells them that it was a

graveyard belonged to a plantation, which by then had been swept by the wind.

At The Tower, where they stopped for barbecued sandwiches, they met Red Sammy, the

owner of The Tower and her wife. As they wait to be served, the children’s mother put some

music and the grandmother nodded as she sat on the chair, while June Star danced on the floor. It

was at then when Red Sammy brought forth a conversation where he exclaimed that people had

changed. He told them of his previous experience where two persons had come to his place. This

story made the grandmother to bring about the issue of The Misfit. She enquired to know if Red

Sammy had read of him. She said that if Misfit could have been aware of the place, could have

already made an attack of it. Red Sammy replied to him saying that the times had changed and

people were no longer the same. He added by saying that a good man was hard to find. He

recalled of the past time as opposed to then when one would sleep with the door open. These two

led a conversation that at the end they blamed Europe for the change of things from better to

worse.

The issue of the secret panel in a house in one of the plantations that the grandmother

recalled near Toombsboro and her need to revisit the place, drew more attention to the little

children that they too wanted to go and see it. The grandmother told that within the secret panel

is where the family silver was put and was not found in the event when Sherman came. They

were to go and see it. However, they had driven past it a mile. They took a turn back and

branched on the dirt road. It had hills and dangerous embankments that even Bailey was willing

to turn back.

While on this dirt road, the grandmother is all over a sudden outdriven by a wild and

horrible thought that her eyes bulged outwards, her feet moved hitting the black valise, which in

turn made the newspaper's top move making a weird sound. This made the cat jumped on

Bailey's shoulder. All of a sudden, the weather was not good anymore. It was an accident. Only

Bailey who remained in the driver’s seat. The grandmother fell on the dashboard, children fell on

the floor while the children’s mother fell outside with her youngest child in her arms. What could

have been this horrible thought? The thought that the house they were going to see was not in

Georgia. It was in Tennessee. This grandmother’s confusion cost them an accident, and

furthermore their lives. The old woman wished she that she found herself hurt, to win the

sympathy of his son Bailey, not to break into wrath when he realized the old woman’s mistake

was the cause of all this. The children’s mother broke her shoulder and had a cut on the face. The

old woman claimed she hurt internally while the children were okay. The car had turned and

remained right side up.

It is in this situation that they decided to seek help from any car that would come along.

They saw a car at a distance in a slow motion speed. The grandmother waved at it to draw their

attention. It came to stop at their place. The driver emotionlessly watched them and conversed

with his two fellows who then came out with guns in their hands. One of them who had

spectacles looked familiar to grandmother. The conversation between these three men with the

accident survivors began with mockery greetings as the man in spectacles referred the accident to

be a ‘little spill’. He claimed they had seen what had happened. He ordered the children’s mother

to call them and sit with her as he claimed they made him nervous. The grandmother, after a

close observation, she recognized him as The Misfit, the person she feared taking her children

towards any direction he or any of his likes was.

The Misfit remarked that it would have been better if he was not recognized. In which

seems to be symbolic of the death awaiting these accident survivors, when he was asked by the

grandmother whether he would shoot a lady, The Misfit first dug a small hole on the ground with

his shoe, covered it and responded saying he would hate doing it. In a hyperbolic manner, Misfit

claims to have come from ‘the finest people in the world’, (Kilcourse, G. 2001). He praised his

parents for being the best creature made by God as the old woman pleads with him not to shoot

them. As their conversation continued, The Misfit orders one of his fellows to check if Bailey's

car was in good condition and Hiram assures them it won’t take him long to repair it. At the

same moment, Bailey reacts commanding everyone to leave the situation facing them upon him

to handle although no one drew to his attention. The Misfit started his mission. He ordered

Bobby Lee to take the little boy together with Bailey to the yonder, big thick forest behind them.

After a moment a gunshot is heard and then, Hiram and Bobby Lee return with Bailey’s shirt

which they gave to The Misfit. Mark you, he had no shirt by then.

The disappearance of Bailey made the grandmother lose breath. She continues to insist

that The Misfit should get to prayer. To think of a beautiful life which he would live without

fears of being chased. She tells him to change. She praises him as a good person from good

people. However, The Misfit cunningly denies all this. He claimed that he was doing it right and

had no need to change. He narrated to her his life before. He even tells of when he was a gospel

singer. Misfit explained to her that he never recalled himself of being a bad boy. However, when

he was accused of killing his father things changed his life. He was caught, taken to court and

treated in a rough and tough way. This made him see nothing-good left with people anymore.

The treatment he says was inequivalent as he claimed to have had done nothing. At this point, he

had ordered the children’s mother to be escorted by Hiram and Bobby Lee to follow his husband,

Bailey. She is killed and the only person left now is the grandmother, (Kilcourse, G. 2001).

The Misfit and the grandmother were now left the two of them. The Misfit revealed to the

old woman that he decided to call herself The Misfit because he was unable to match what he

had done with the punishment he received. He claimed that Jesus had made all things off

balance. He compared his case with Jesus’. The only difference with it, as he said, is that Jesus

had not done anything but The Misfit's case was provable. In a more ironical way, The Misfit

claimed that if he could have been on the scene to see if Jesus rose the dead, he would not have

been the way he was. That is why he would not believe in Jesus. All in a flash, with his face

wrinkled and near the grandmother's, he shot the grandmother three times on her chest.

The Misfit took off her spectacles to clean them. He ordered the Hiram and Bobby Lee to

take the body of the grandmother to where the rest were. To Bobby Lee, The Misfit yelled at him

not to talk about how the old woman was a talker or how funny it was. He ordered him not even

to whisper as he concluded that the grandmother would have been even good if she had someone

to shoot her in every moment she lived her life. (Kilcourse, G. 2001).

It is indeed true to say that, a good man is hard to find. This is even told by Red Sammy

to the grandmother. The grandmother herself regrets she could have been married to Mr. Edgar

Atkins Teagarden, who courted her while she worked as a maiden because he had proved to be

good to her to an extent bringing her watermelons every weekend. It is clear that from this story

that times have changed and become terrible: a world full of impunity, injustice, violent crimes

and killings. This, as compared by Red Sammy in their conversation with the grandmother was

not the case in the past. In a scenario where people have had an accident, and are all in groan

and pain, we would expect one to sympathize with them and help them. However, it is

dehumanizing to see how The Misfit with his fellows mistreated the grandmother together with

her family members. However, even though our life situations may make us harden our heart, it

is more unreasonable to ignore the spiritual realm as he did The Misfit. The grandmother, with

all her fears, ironically met her death, in a way that really proves that a good man is hard to find.

Work Cited

Kilcourse, G. (2001). Flannery O'Connor's Religious Imagination: A World with Everything Off

Balance. Paulist Press.

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A good man is hard to find

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