There’s something about dead bodies that just gets to me. That probably explains my gag-reflex at seeing pictures from the holocaust and my lack of enthusiasm for such entities. And so when McCarthy says that “the charred meat and bones under the damp ash might have been anonymous save for the shapes of the skulls,” I get a little peeved. Okay. A lot.
But yet I still notice that the description itself is beautiful in way that the charred meat is the burnt remains of what used to be alive and bones are obstructed from the view by damp, dirty ash that reminds them of the destructive place they inhabit. Later on he goes to explain that there is no longer any smell. So there’s no smell for death? There once was a smell when they were alive, and probably when the flesh was burnt, but now it’s almost non-existent. There’s no smell. It’s as if they were never there.
This occurs when they pass through an abandoned town and find a metal trash dump. After falling asleep a few hours later, the dad is woken up by another dream. A dream in which “he’d been visited by creatures of a kind he’d never seen before.” Said creatures didn’t speak. And that’s all he could remember. No matter how hard he tries, all that is left is the feeling of it. But why did he dream of that? Is it possible that the world is going to be taken over by mute aliens who make a habit of haunting your dreams? TUN TUN TUN. Or maybe they’re coming over to save every single living human being. Okay, who am I kidding? No one would intentionally try to save the human race (let’s just face it, we suck). Maybe they came to warn him that all that waits in the future is more foreign concepts and shades of grey that don’t make sense (this being because they’re probably more ashes, atop of more ashes, atop of sad remains of death). Maybe.
After he wakes up, he has another conversation with his son. It surprises me how naïve and unknowledgeable the boy is. It never ceases to amaze me that he asks the most random questions like if they could go to Mars if they had a spaceship or crows could fly there in their feathery wings. The fact that he asks the questions truly wanting a response and actually being so youthful in asking whether people know where Mars is. It is cute and sad at the same time. Because while the boy learns about all these ‘brand-new’ things, I think about the life he could have had where these would have been basic knowledge. But he doesn’t.
Let’s not forget the constant “Okay’s” this little one has made his signature style of conversation. “Dog’s lay eggs. But all dogs are dead.” Response: “Okay.” He asks “Are we going to die?” only to be answered by a “No, because we have magical faeries that will send us female counterparts so we can fornicate and save the human race,” and his answer? “Okay.” Now for an actually quote from the novel, when his dad tells him he threw away his flute, he asks “You threw it away?” And when they father answers in the affirmative all he says is, you guessed it, “Okay.” Okay is usually used to agree with something. The boy is so simple and trusting that whatever his father says, he accepts. He accepts every little thing and so I wonder if deep down he’s that resigned.
If deep down he’s as passive and docile as he outwardly seems to be.
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