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Mary Beth Westbrook ENGL 3330 Prof. Sutherland March 29, 2013 Family Ties In the novel Out of the Dust, the main character Billie Jo learns a valuable lesson about what it truly means to be a family. With the death of her mother and infant brother, Billy Jo and her father are forced to take a hard look at not only the deep impact that that loss has on their family dynamic but the dynamic of their own relationship and what it says about family. In the beginning of the novel, Billie Jo is fourteen years old and she lives only with her mother and her father. She tells the reader that her father had wished for a boy when she was born and by the time she was 9 years old he has given up hoping that his wife will bear him a son. They have no close relatives; only Aunt Ellis who lives in Lubbock and Uncle Floyd who lives in Dallas. The three of them, Billie Jo, her mother and her father, are all they have besides the land. Billie Jo seems to have a fairly normal relationship with her mother for a girl of fourteen. Sometimes they do not see eye to eye but at the end of the day they still love each other. The strongest bond between them develops when Billie Jo is five and her mother sits her down and teaches her piano. Music and performing are the two greatest loves of Billie Jos young life and she has her mother to thank for that. The music is what holds Billie Jo in awe of her mother. She states that, In the kitchen she is my ma, / in the barn and the fields she is my daddys wife, / but in the parlor Ma is something different I remember being dazzled by her/ whenever she played the piano (Dazzled). While Billie Jo is undoubtedly grateful towards her mother of bestowing

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the gift of music upon her, it also arises as a point of contention between the two. When Arley Wanderdale asks Billie Jo to play for a show that will take her out of school, Ma says no. Billie Jo is angry at her mother and states that sometimes I think shes/ just plain jealous/ when Im at the piano/ and shes not (Foul as Maggoty Stew). While Billie Jos assumption that her mother is envious of the opportunities presented to her daughter and afraid that the music will take her away are not unfounded, Billie Jo fails to see that her mothers true concern is that she will miss school even though Billie Jo tells the reader earlier that Shes an old mule on the subject of my schooling (Me and Mad Dog). Billie Jo is a typical teenager in that she does not see that all her mother does is out of love. It isnt until after her mother is taken away from her that she truly begins to understand her mothers vital role in the life of their little family. Billie Jo did not have a perfect relationship with her mother. Some days she would even glare at Mas back with a scowl/ foul as maggoty stew (Foul as Maggoty Stew). However, Billie Jo does not realize how important her mother is to her until she is suddenly taken away. Before her death, Ma was never one to heap excessive praise and affection on Billy Jo. It was not her way. When Billie Jo scored the highest on state test in her grade for the whole state, she is excited to tell her mother, thinking that she will be proud. However, when Billie Jo informs her mother of her success the only reply she receives is, knew you could (State Tests). Billie Jo is disappointed in her mothers reaction and wishes shed give me a little more to hold on to (State Tests). After her mother dies, Billie Jo realizes how much even the smallest words from her mother meant so much. When her school scores top in the state on the state administered test again, Billie Jo wishes she could run home and tell Ma/ and see her nod/ and hear her say, / I knew you could. (State Tests Again). Billie Jo realizes that those words from her mother were precious but she did not know that until she would never hear those words again. After she is

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gone, every little thing about Ma stands out to Billy Jo; even down to the cranberry sauce at Thanksgiving. Billy Jo never realizes how much her mother meant to her until she was gone forever. When the accident happens that ends the life of Ma and baby Franklin, Billie Jo had no idea the impact it would have on not only her life but on the relationship she had with her father. Ma was the glue that held the family together and in her absence there is a deep chasm that grows between Billie Jo and her father. The main source of this rift is the blame for Mas death. The women who came to clean up after he mothers death whisper about how Billie Jo threw the pail [of kerosene],/they said. An accident,/they said. / Under their words a finger pointed (Blame). At first, Billie Jo accepts the fault for her mothers death. However, as time goes on, Billy Jo comes to resent her father more and more for being the one to leave the kerosene by the stove in the first place. She even states she can almost forgive him the taking of Mas money./ I can almost forgive him his night in Guymon,/ getting drunk./ But as long as I live/I cant forgive him that pail of kerosene/ left by the side of the stove(The Hole). In Billie Jos mind, her father is the reason she is motherless. She even stops referring to him as Daddy and calls him my father. We do not get her fathers perspective but it would be easy to speculate that he must place blame on her as well for throwing the kerosene. This blame game causes the hole left by Ma and baby Franklin to widen further. Another cause for the rift between Billy Jo and her father also stems from the act that he had always wanted a son. When Billy Jo was born, her father had been hoping for a boy but got her instead. Billy Jo was quite aware of this fact and knew that her father kept hoping that Ma would get pregnant again and that this time he would have his son. It could not have been easy growing up with the knowledge that your own father wished you were something else. When Ma

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finally does get pregnant, it turns out it was a boy. However, it is too late and the baby dies shortly after being born. Billy Jo instinctively knows that her father blames her not only for the death of her mother but also for the loss of his son. Though he never comes right out and says it, Billy Jo knows that her father blames her for his unhappiness. Eventually Billie Jo cannot take the strain between her and her father. Since the accident, Billie Jo has given [her] father so many chances/ to understand, to/ reach out, to/ love me (Midnight Truth). She sees his digging the pond her mother once suggested as his way of digging his own grave; it seems to her that her father intends to leave her all alone in the dust. Billie Jo makes the decision to leave him first. It is this decision that makes it possible for Billie Jo to begin to understand her father. When meets the man on the train and thinks about his family missing him, Billy Jo realizes that she must go back. When her father meets her at the train station, Billy Jo states that she call[s] him/ Daddy/ for the first time since Ma died (Met). This seemingly small and simple gesture is the first step down the road to reconciliation with her father. She also confides in her father her fears of being alone by saying, I cant be my own mother/ and I cant be my own father (Met). As their relationship slowly heals, Billy Jo realizes things about her father and their relationship that she had never consciously realized before. Whilst going through the boxes from her closet, Billy Jo realizes that she and her father have more in common than [their] red hair/ and [their] long legs/ and the way [they] rub [their] eyes (Cut It Deep). She realizes that they both dreamed of getting out of the dust and that they both cannot because they belong to the land. While they go through Mas things, it is as if Billy Jo becomes aware that not only did she lose a mother/brother but her father also lost a wife/son.

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Billy Jos feeling of home and family slowly comes back together as she and her father begin to reacquaint themselves with each other. The final piece comes into place in the form of Louise, her fathers new girlfriend. Billy Jo is skeptical of the stranger at first, but Louise slowly disarms her. Billy Jo says I didnt intend to, but I liked her (The Other Woman). Louises presence slowly brings Daddy and Billy Jo back from the depths of their despair because She knows how to smooth things between two/ redheaded people. / And she knows how to come into a home/ and not step on the toes of a ghost (Teamwork).Billy Jo begins to feel a sense of family again with the presence of Louise in her life. Louise fills the void left by Ma without trying to take her place. In the end, Billy Jo realizes that family is more than just a word or a unit of people living under the same roof. Family is who you are and how the people you love form a core part of you that you dont always notice until part of it goes missing. Eventually, Billy Jo reconciles with her father and discovers that though her mother will always be in her heart, there is always the ability to make room for more people. Billy Jo allows Louise to come into her heart and heal her as does her father. In the end, Billy Jo knows that they will all be ok because they have each other and they are a family.