Cities of the Plain

“The whores in their shabby deshabille looked up from the shabby sofas where they sat. The place was all but empty.”

The cowboys and the sex workers are part of a world as rundown and as shabby as the world they inhabit. With the changing ways of modernity, the worlds they know have been left behind. Even though there are both sex workers and customers, the bar is empty because the way of life itself is empty, made meaningless by the changing times.

“I love this life. You love this life, son? I love this life. You do love this life dont you? Cause by god I love it. Just love it.”

[Note: McCarthy leaves apostrophes out of negative contractions.]

Billy says this to affirm his love and receive validation from his friend. Their shared life as cowboys bonds them together and defines their identity. Despite the changing ways of the world, Billy and John Grady love their lifestyles. They are natural cowboys who cannot imagine living in any other way. Billy repeats his love for this way of life as an act of defiance and to receive validation from his friend. Billy loves something that is fading away; he repeats his love to John Grady to preserve the idea of his way of life for as long as possible. Both men need one another, not only for friendship but for support in coping with the rapid encroachment of modernity.