This short story was... interesting. I honestly say that with hesitation because I'm not really comfortable with calling it "good", just because even though the ending was expected, I did feel bad about everything that happened throughout the course of the short story. I think one thing that fascinated me about this story was that in class the next day it seemed like literally everyone was eager to throw the grandmother under the bus, but for me, I just couldn't help but feel bad for her the entire time.
Maybe it's just because I'm biased. I'm fortunate enough to have a seriously amazing family. We're all so close, and there's a lot of us. I consider myself just as close to my second cousins as I do my first. And my maternal grandma really is the driving force between all the family reunions, pasta dinners on Sundays, and really getting everyone into the holiday spirit. We all respect her. My other grandmother however, the one on my dad's side, I feel like she could relate to the grandmother in this story. I will be brutally honest and say that my paternal grandmother doesn't really have as much footing when it comes to family dynamics as my maternal one. However, she is southern, and she really is well-intentioned, and I've just come to respect my elders no matter what. Even she seems out of place when you look at the rest of my family, I come from a largely Italian background, everyone else in my family was born and raised in my hometown and our roots are here, whereas my grandmother was born in Kentucky before moving up north a little bit. Unfortunately, part of her just didn't "fit in" with the rest of us. I hate to go off on a tangent about family life, but it gives you some context into my analysis of "A Good Man is Hard to Find".
Anyways, what I'm trying to get at is that I don't really understand why it felt like no one else in the class really felt any sympathy for the grandmother in "A Good Man is Hard To Find". It seems like the children treat the grandmother as a joke, her own kid doesn't seem to take her seriously, I just feel bad for her. I do agree that she kind of makes some poor decisions in the story but at least her intentions are there? Her grandchildren seem bored of her most of the time, and she just wanted to do something that would excite them, while in turn raising her stock with her grandkids, and that maybe she is a "cool grandma". It does seem like the grandmother knows what she's talking about, I find it hard to believe that she would lie to them for no reason and in turn delay the trip, which seemed hellish enough to her already. She simply made a mistake with the state the mansion was in. No one is perfect, so I just found it a little sad how everyone was so quick to judge the grandmother, but the character in the story as well as the other people in class?
I suppose the death of the entire family has to blamed on someone, but I just don't think you can put the responsibility solely on the grandmother. The first line even says it, she didn't want to go to Florida in the first place, she knew there was the Misfit running around. Sure, she was the one who led them on the broken path, but she wouldn't have even suggested it had her son and her grandkids put in more of an effort with her throughout the trip. I know a lot of people feel that even when the car crashes, they still could have all made it out alive even when the Misfit does show up, and that the grandmother trying to get through to the Misfit was what ultimately sealed their fate, but I disagree. Sure, the grandmother forcing "the power of Jesus" or whatever onto the Misfit in that situation certainly didn't help matters, but it didn't make them matters worse in my opinion either. In my opinion, the family was as good as dead once Misfit and his lackeys step out of the car, nothing can possibly be said or done to save the family at that point. The grandmother just tried to throw a Hail Mary, a last-ditch effort to absolve the situation but it ultimately failed. At least she tried. Her intentions were there.
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