“Goodbye, My Brother” was originally published in the New Yorker on August 25, 1951 and tells the story of the Pommeroy family sharing a vacation together at the their shared summer home on Laud’s Head, Massachusetts.
The family consists of a widowed mother and her four adult children - Diana who is recently divorced and living in France, Chaddy, the unnamed narrator, and the youngest of the family, Lawrence. Since they are all grown and married with children of their own, they aren’t often all in the same place, especially with Diana now living in France. Lawrence has always been distant from the rest of the family, living all over the country, but has recently moved back to the East Coast and has surprised the family by joining them at Laud’s Head with his wife Ruth and two anxious children.
The family gets along well, with the exception of Lawrence, who finds fault in everything and everyone. There has always been tension between him and his mother, whom he finds frivolous. During his time at Laud’s Head, he often gets in disagreements with his mother and siblings over a variety of things including the sustainability of the house, a costume party, and the family’s summer pastimes.
Finally, Lawrence joins his brother, the narrator, on a walk along the beach where he tells the narrator he isn’t having fun and that whole purpose of the trip was to tell them he was selling back his portion of the house and saying goodbye to them all. He lists everything he disapproves of in their family, claiming that the narrator is a fool, Diana is promiscuous, Chaddy is dishonest, and their mother is a drunk. The narrator becomes so frustrated with his brother’s pessimism and judgment, that he hits him over the head with a root he finds lying on the shore. He is shocked and wonders about leaving Lawrence lying there to be swallowed up by the waves but soon helps him to his feet, walking him away from the water. Lawrence is bleeding, but conscious. The narrator turns to leave him and walks back to the house. Eventually Lawrence shows up back at the house frantically yelling that his brother had hit him and that he was taking his family and leaving. He leaves early the next day with his wife and children.
“The Common Day” was originally published in the New Yorker on August 2, 1947 and centers on a regular day at a country home in New Hampshire during the mid-twentieth century.
Jim Brown, his wife Ellen, and their young son Timmy are visiting Ellen’s mother, Mrs. Garrison at her home in the country. Ellen’s sister Florrie has also left her four year old daughter Carlotta at the house while she gets a divorce. Mrs. Garrison has a variety of servants including a Swedish gardener and cook named Nils and Greta, a French maid named Emma, and an Irish maid named Agnes who also acts as the caregiver for young Carlotta. Mrs. Garrison appears to be well-off, with the ability to maintain a large country home and staff who cater to her and her family's every need. She spends an hour a day with her granddaughter and the children eat their meals in the kitchen, separate from the adults.
Over the course of the day, the story touches briefly on some of the concerns of the adults. Ellen has anxiety about living in a city like New York if there were to be a war and constantly hopes to convince Jim to move to a country home. Mrs. Garrison frets over her lost youth and becomes frustrated by Carlotta wishing to be an adult. Agnes has grown attached to Carlotta, feeling a fierce motherly protection over her and has hopes that she can continue on as Carlotta’s nurse even after she is returned to her mother in the city. Finally, Nils is frustrated with Mrs. Garrison because she is constantly asking him to move around flowers, rather than appreciating all of the hard work he puts in to the estate, including keeping it open and accessible for her in the winter, despite her never showing up. He eventually gets so frustrated that he yells at her in front of Jim and Ellen.
“The Hartleys” was first published in the January 22, 1949 issue of the New Yorker and tells the story of a New York City family on a ski vacation.
Mr and Mrs Hartley and their young daughter Anne come to the Pemaquoddy Inn, run by a Mrs Butterick. Every day they go skiing on the slopes, with Anne insisting that only her father teach her. When Mr Hartley helps Anne, she is confident and quick to learn, however when he leaves her with an instructor in the afternoons, she becomes sad and retreats to the hut, waiting for her parents by the fireplace until evenings when they are finished skiing and head back to the inn together.
The family seems friendly and polite, with Mr Hartley explaining that him and his wife visited the Pemaquoddy once 8 years ago and had a very happy visit. One day, Mr and Mrs Hartley ask to have their dinner served to them in their room while Anne plays with the other children at the inn. When a maid brings up their dinner, she overhears Mr and Mrs Hartley arguing. Mrs Hartley wishes they could just separate, rather than try to relive their happy moments at places from their past when they are no longer happy with each other.
The next day, the weather is too cold and icy and the slopes are all closed except for the hill behind the inn which is serviced by a rickety tow bar lift installed years ago by Mrs Butterick’s son. The guests all decide to ski on the hill and Anne is happy to have her father within sight all afternoon. She quickly joins in the skiing, riding up the lift and skiing down with her parents until she suddenly becomes stuck in the fraying rope of the tow and dragged up the hill into the iron wheel where her neck snaps and she dies. Mr and Mrs Hartley return to New York that night, driving together behind the hearse.
“Christmas is a Sad Season for the Poor” was first published in the December 24, 1949 issue of the New Yorker and follows the story of Charlie, an elevator operator at a wealthy apartment building in New York City.
Charlie wakes up at 6 a.m. on Christmas morning to go to work and is miserable, feeling that he is one of the only people out there that must work on Christmas morning while everyone else is asleep and cozy in their homes. As the day goes on and he picks up people on different floors, they all wish him a Merry Christmas and he complains to them that it isn’t a happy holiday for him as he is alone. He starts embellishing and tells some of the tenants that he is a poor father, despite not having any children, or that his wife is crippled, despite not having a wife at all. He believes the rich tenants of the apartment building won’t really care, yet as dinnertime approaches, they all start calling for him and giving him plates of food, drinks, and presents.
Charlie begins to get drunk and starts to feel jollier about the world. In an act of carelessness, he lets the elevator free fall, scaring a passenger who immediately complains to the superintendent. The superintendent fires Charlie right away and he returns to the storage locker that contains all the gifts he has received throughout the day. Looking at the gifts, Charlie feels guilty at having taken advantage of the tenants’ goodwill, especially seeing all the toys donated to his nonexistent children. However, he soon gets excited at the idea of donating these toys to the poor family below him with a single mom and three kids.
He packs everything up and leaves the apartment building, feeling like Santa Claus when he delivers the presents to the neighbor family. Unbeknownst to him, these children have already received donated gifts so that after he leaves, their mother makes them donate Charlie’s gifts to the Deckkers, a family on Hudson Street that the mother says have nothing at all. The mother, feeling powerful that she can now be the one to give charity sets off with her children to donate the gifts to the Deckkers, who will then donate the gifts to an even needier family.
