Family, Isolation, and Loss Theme Analysis

In Raymond Carver’s “A Small, Good Thing,” Ann and Howard Weiss’s son, Scotty, slips into a coma after being hit by a car on his birthday and dies soon after. When Ann goes to pick up what was supposed to be Scotty’s birthday cake and tells the baker about her son’s tragic death, he tells her about the loneliness of baking cakes for birthdays and weddings without having children of his own. In her grief, Ann thinks about how she and Howard are alone now, too, even though they once had a child. Through Ann, Howard, and the baker, the story suggests that while family can be a source of deep satisfaction and support—which is why not having it can be so painful—it’s not a perfect balm against feelings of loneliness and grief.

At the beginning of the story, Ann is clearly happy and fulfilled by her family ties and assumes that other people must enjoy this kind of satisfying connection with family, too. When she orders a birthday cake from a baker, she is confused by his disinterest in her son’s birthday, because she thinks that he “must have children who’d gone through this special time of cakes and birthday parties.” She can’t understand why he wouldn’t feel the same interest and excitement she does when discussing a child’s birthday party, because she assumes everyone must have the benefit of having a family and watching one’s children grow up. The family of another boy in the hospital also provides an example of the deep sense of connection and support that family can give. While waiting for updates on their son Franklin’s surgery, Franklin’s family comes together for a long vigil in the waiting room. The table before them is littered with food wrappers and cigarette butts, implying that they’ve been there a long time. They wait with bated breath for updates about Franklin, and when Ann walks through the waiting room, they hound her for information about how their son is doing, mistaking her for a nurse. The family’s deep anxiety about their son’s well-being, as well as their commitment to being there for him through his surgery, speaks to the idea that family can be a powerful source of support and connection.

However, since family can be such an important source of connection, satisfaction, and belonging, the story underscores that losing a family member—or not having family to begin with, like the baker—means painfully losing access to these things. After her son’s death, Ann becomes more cynical about the value of having children. She looks at Franklin’s teenage sister and thinks, “don’t have children […] for God’s sake, don’t,” as if she believes that having children—and possibly losing them one day—will cause only suffering for the girl.

Once, family was a source of fulfillment for Ann, but now that she’s lost Scotty, she thinks of family as just a different way to end up lonely. This is shown when, after Scotty’s death, Ann thinks about how she and Howard are going to be alone from now on. She realizes that she is just as lonely after Scotty’s death as someone who doesn’t have children—like the baker—would be. When the couple gets home from the hospital without their son, she tells Howard that Scotty’s “gone and now we’ll have to get used to that. To being alone.” This is similar to the “empty nest” many parents face when they are left alone in the house after their children grow up and move out. Howard and Ann are empty nesters now because their child is gone, but while most parents have to adjust to being empty nesters after their children have grown up, Ann and Howard lose the experience of watching this process unfold and lose their connection with their child entirely.

The story suggests that this experience of a lack of connection is similar to that of having no children in the first place. After Ann tells the baker about Scotty’s death, the baker “began to speak of loneliness, and of the sense of doubt and limitation that had come to him in his middle years. He told them what it was like to be childless all these years.” He describes the loneliness of baking cakes for birthdays and weddings without having children of his own to share those same experiences with. And just as the baker bakes cakes for other people’s weddings and birthdays but never gets to enjoy them himself, the cake Ann ordered for Scotty also goes uneaten. Ann now experiences the same loneliness as the childless baker does, even though she once had a child of her own.

Although the story frames family as a key source of support and connection, it also shows that family is not some perfect shield against loneliness: even when the characters still have family ties, they can still feel isolated. For instance, even after Ann and Howard have lost their son, they still have part of their family left in each other. However, neither of them seems to consider this a real protection from loneliness. When Ann and Howard get home from the hospital and Ann declares they’ll be alone from this point on, they aren’t actually alone. They still have each other, so they have some semblance of family, but this doesn’t protect them from the deep loneliness that comes from losing a child. Likewise, Ann notes that while Scotty was in the hospital, it hardly occurred to her that the accident was affecting her husband, too. She thought of it as a tragedy encompassing only her and her son, even though her husband had been at the hospital all along—and Scotty was his son, too. This disconnection underscores that having family, though often a critical source of support and connection, doesn’t always mean protection from loneliness.