Cold Sassy Tree: Chapter 32

Chapter 32 Summary
 
Mary Willis is suddenly convinced that it is all right for her to go to New York with her husband. She has been wanting to for some time. Grandpa bursts in just then saying that since Mary Willis won’t go to New York, he is going to go and take Love. Love thinks she would be good at buying for the store. Grandpa tells Will he wants to get Love away from Cold Sassy for a while. It was Love’s idea.
 
Will rushes to Grandpa’s and tells Love that his mother was counting on going. Love then agrees she will back out. She says it was Grandpa’s idea. Will wonders at this discrepancy in their stories. Mary Willis won’t go now, so Grandpa and Love will go to New York.
 
Grandpa gives out invitations for people to come to his Sunday service at home. Only one couple shows up. Grandpa and Love have too much fun, singing all manner of songs, like they are making fun of religion.
 
Chapter 32 Commentary
 
Love and Grandpa both have cheerful dispositions and like to enjoy themselves. This does not square with the notion of religion as somber held by the townspeople. In addition, Grandpa’s preaching is heresy since he doesn’t dwell on sin or doctrine.
 
Grandpa finds out Will’s plan to become a farmer, and they fight over his future. Grandpa doesn’t understand Will’s lack of gratitude. He is having the store handed to him, and he’d rather do something risky. Will says that neither Loma nor Grandpa listen about what he would like to do, and he sticks to his own ideas of the future. Will shows himself to be as stubborn as Grandpa.
 
The tension over the trip to New York is piling on more and more hostility in the family war. There is a mystery about who thought up the idea of Grandpa and Love going on the trip, since their stories about it are different.