"Carryin Fire"

At the end of No Country For Old Men, Sheriff Bell remembers two dreams he had after his father died.  This is the second:

 . . . it was like we was both back in older times and I was on horseback goin through the mountains of a night.  Goin through this pass in the mountains.  It was cold and there was snow on the ground and he rode past me and kept on goin.  Never said nothin.  He just rode on past and he had this blanket wrapped around him and he had his head down and when he rode past I seen he was carryin fire in a horn the way people used to do and I could see the horn from the light inside it.  About the color of the moon.  And in the dream I knew that he was goin on ahead and that he was fixin to make a fire somewhere out there in all that dark and all that cold and I knew that whenever I got there he would be there.  And then I woke up.

In What Is To Come, Sheriff Bell reflects on the changes in the world, changes that have led him to retire after 36 years because he feels overmatched.  His description of the dream as the novel ends can be interpreted in two ways.  First, as an acknowledgement that however hopeless the fight for right appears, there is always some hope (as symbolized by the fire made by his father) that should motivate us to continue.  Whether we succeed is not material.  The second is that the while the dream conveys this, Bell's final words "And then I woke up", means he woke up from the dream's delusion that there is some hope, some light and comfort ahead, from the violence and randomness that exists in the world.  I prefer the first interpretation.

Tommy Lee Jones performance in the movie, and in particular, the sound and cadence of his voice, played in my head as I read the parts of the novel concerning Sheriff Bell.  Although Llewelyn Moss and Anton Chigurh have the flashier roles in the book and movie, it is Sheriff Bell who is the main character, the only one who reflects and changes in the course of both.  After all, the title is No Country For Old Men.

There are two phrases we hear frequently these days:

"The right side of history"

"The moral arc of the universe bends toward justice"

Let me mash up the two and give a version which, I believe, is more accurate:

"The arc of history bends towards violence" 

Any examination of history leads to that conclusion.  History does not have a right or wrong side.  But what we must treasure are those brief periods of respite from that arc.  We must appreciate what it takes to disrupt that arc.  It is not an easy task.  We often fail, but it is worth trying.  Too often, we take for granted those periods of relative peace, stability, and security, and underestimate their value and the achievement of those who helped bring about those times.  And, most of all, to value and love our families and friends, who despite the turmoil and troubles of the world, are the refuges where we can provide support to each other.

In No Country For Old Men, Sheriff Bell comes to question the world around him and the assumptions he has based his life upon, but the one thing that never falters from start to finish is his love, faith, and reliance on his wife Loretta, a much larger character in the book than in the movie.