The Only People Here: Canonical Babbling In Peed Onk By Lorrie Moore

Cancer is one of the most lethal diseases one can have. Watching a loved one fight this illness can be very emotionally challenging. This is the main conflict presented in the short story “People Like That Are the Only People Here: Canonical Babbling in Peed Onk” by Lorrie Moore. This text tells the story of a mother finding out her child has a tumor on his kidney and her coping with the disease and the medical procedures he goes through. Thus, one coping with their child’s illness can be challenging, but ultimately it can change them and their relationship with their child. Moore shows how emotionally challenging it can be for a parent to see their child suffer from illness. Firstly, she uses narration to show this by making the narrative

Firstly, Moore mentions that “[i]n her other life, [… the Mother] had been a believer in alternative medicine. Chemotherapy? Unthinkable. Now, suddenly, alternative medicine seems the wacko maiden aunt to the Nice Big Daddy of Conventional Treatment” (481). Since the Baby’s life is on the line, the Mother changes her initial views of medicine because she wants what is best for her child. Secondly, Moore uses symbolism to demonstrate that the Mother changes some of her beliefs; she does so to cope with the Baby’s cancer. This happens when she begins to bargain for her own life in return for her child’s health, with what she calls a Higher Morality, and pictures this divine figure as the manager at Marshall Field’s. This is a sign that the mother is changing, because Moore tells the readers that “[t]he Mother is not a shopper. She hates to shop, is generally bad at it, though she does like a good sale” (485). By mentioning this, readers understand that the Mother does not usually bargain, which alludes that never in her life did she look up to a divine figure to help her through challenges. In sum, Moore demonstrates that one way of coping with difficult situations includes changing one’s views and

Firstly, Moore uses dialogue to show the strong bond between the Mother and the Baby. When she is back home, she prepares the Baby for a nap, and it is when he is falling asleep that she realizes that she might lose him. She then tells him: “’If you go,’ […] ‘we are going with you. We are nothing without you. […] Wherever this takes you, we are following. We will be there. Don’t be scared. We are going too. That is that’” (484). In this dialogue, readers understand the intense love she feels and that she cannot see a life without her child in it. Secondly, Moore shows how much the Mother hates seeing her child suffer and simply wants him to be healthy. After the operation, the Mother goes to see the Baby, and after the horror of seeing him attached to so many medical tools, “[s]he wants to pick [him up] and run – out of there, out of there. […] Don’t you touch him! she wants to shout at the surgeons and the needle nurses. Not anymore! No more! No more!” (497). Her desire to run away from the hospital demonstrates the love she has for him and how much she wishes for her baby to be healthy. In sum, Moore shows how stronger bonds between people can be made when one is at risk of passing away from