I’ll admit it: I’m a little slow, at times. I just discovered Kent Haruf’s novel,
Plainsong –a best-seller back in 1999. “Better late than never” clearly applies. The novel still speaks powerfully to our times.
After Haruf’s death in 2014,
one reviewer wrote, “his great subject was the struggle of decency against small-mindedness, and his rare gift was to make sheer decency a moving subject.” He does indeed.
Plainsong traces the intertwining lives of several people in the fictional town of Holt, Colorado, a small farming community on the high plains.
None of these characters are perfect. Tom Guthrie is a high-school teacher struggling to raise his two young boys alone, and whose patience is sorely tested by a belligerent student. The McPheron brothers are crusty old bachelor farmers, who live 17 miles from town and have all the social graces of one of their stubborn cows. Victoria Roubideaux is a pregnant teenager, whose mother, upon learning of the pregnancy, kicks the girl out of the house.
Maggie Jones, one of Guthrie’s fellow teachers, is the thread that binds them all together. When Victoria turns to her for help, Maggie has the improbable idea of asking the McPheron brothers to take Victoria in. When the two old men hesitate, Maggie says, “Oh, I know it sounds crazy…. But that girl needs somebody…. And you – she smiled at them – you old solitary bastards need somebody too. Somebody … to care about and worry about…. You’re going to die some day without ever having had enough trouble in your life. Not of the right kind anyway. This is your chance.”
Decency, she reminds them, and Haruf reminds us, is not a solo act. It is not achieved standing on the sidelines. It requires taking a chance on other people. The McPheron brothers take the chance and invite Victoria to stay with them. And yes, awkwardness and trouble ensue, but caring and decency win out. Maggie herself takes a chance and befriends Guthrie and his boys.
The novel ends with all of them, now including Victoria’s new baby, gathered at the McPheron’s to celebrate Memorial Day. It has all the trappings of a family feast: three generations gather for a big meal, the boys holding the baby while the women cook and the men chat out by the corral. But they are not family. They are simply decent people who have reached out to help others in need.
When his boys want to hold the baby, Guthrie says, “I don’t know about this. They might be careless with her.” Victoria responds, “No they won’t. I know they’ll take good care of her.” That’s what they all do. They are companions on the journey through life. They take care of one another.
-- Bill