God replies, "I don't care."

[wally wonder]

Did a re-read of the green mile this weekend past. real tear-jerker, hey? But am a bit troubled by those who "don't care" in the green mile. God, for one. The big guy doesn't care. page 535 my pb copy. and that wharton fellow, the weird one, he just doesn't care. that phrase is used a number of times to describe that wharton guy.

little aside here while i try to find the other quote to do with 'doesn't care." the green mile is one of about four or five novels w/that fascinating phrase, "what in the blue fook was that about!" Anderson roared. or some variation on that theme. dark tower. eddie says it. tommyknockers, i believe. others.

gosh. can't find the other "doesn't care" quote. but it applied to john coffey. i think maybe it had to do w/memory. he'd forget things. didn't seem to let things bother him too much. but that's not right, because he heard them screaming and he did care and he cried. lots.

anyway, i'll come back to this. but did anyone else pick up on that "doesn't care" idea? william wharton, the weirdo, doesn't care. God, doesn't care.
J.C. but his "doesn't care" seems to apply to memory.

there's stuff about memory in there, too. and writing. trying to get a handle on it all, so any direction would be appreciated.

[wally wonder]

Found that other place where the phrase, he didn’t care, is used to describe a character, in this case, john coffey, and paul our narrator is doing the describing, this just after john coffeey helped him, paul, by curing his problem going potty. He asks jc, how he helped it. Jc just gives the old head shake and lies down on his bunk. part 3, coffey’s hands, chapter 3 of that part. Jc is “an enigma wrapped in a mystery” so thinks paul, ‘that’s what john coffey was, and I suppose the only reason he could sleep at night was because he didn’t care.’

‘knew his name and knew it wasn’t spelled like the drink, and that was just about all he cared to know.’

Toward the end, as paul is looking back over the pages he wrote, wondering if there is some meaning there and then he gets into that bit about how that weirdo wharton was able to kill the detterick twins, cause of their love for each other, and paul concludes, ‘if it happens, got lets it happen and when we say I don’t understand god replies I don’t care.

Wharton is described as a con who just doesn’t care. Happens earlier in the story. The words are underlined even. Had to do a double take at that, make sure it wasn’t something I’d underlined on a previous read. Pretty sure it was printed that way.

What to make of it all. Do you care? I think jc did care, otherwise he wouldn’t have gotten all weepy like he did at times. And I don’t agree w/paul’s assessment that god doesn’t care. Wharton, yeah, he didn’t care. Don’t know what to make of it.

Why is it that both wharton and john coffey, as well as god, are described that way. They didn’t care. Seems like there’s degrees of difference among the three. I don’t know.

[Patricia A]

Well I'm not sure if I'm catching all of what you mean, but it really sucks when the people/Gods who are in charge of you "just don't care."
It's agonizing when you feel like you are in the hands of someone who doesn't give a crap about you whether it's true or not.
Maybe that's the gist.

[thymeoperator]

i'm not sure what you mean with this post. there are a hell of a lot of people in the world who don't care though, so i can see why they'd make their way into stories? sorry, could be off on what you mean.

[wally wonder]

i dunno. i'm not as troubled by it as i was when i read it this past week. all those folk "not caring". john coffey, god, the wharton weirdo. i wish i could reach a point where i don't care, not in the way wharton didn't care, and who really knows about god anyway, but maybe like coffey. thing is, he cared. so i didn't see where paul got off describing him as "not caring". the description is coupled with memory, i think. coffey forgot things soon enough, but the voices were always there, reminding him of stuff. i dunno. gonna have to think on it some. try to get a handle on it. thank you!

[MadamMack]

i dunno. i'm not as troubled by it as i was when i read it this past week. all those folk "not caring". john coffey, god, the wharton weirdo. i wish i could reach a point where i don't care, not in the way wharton didn't care, and who really knows about god anyway, but maybe like coffey. thing is, he cared. so i didn't see where paul got off describing him as "not caring". the description is coupled with memory, i think. coffey forgot things soon enough, but the voices were always there, reminding him of stuff. i dunno. gonna have to think on it some. try to get a handle on it. thank you!

Bluey we care about you and I've noticed for weeks that something is bothering you. If you stop caring or have tried to stop . . . you've given up. Don't give up. You close your heart when you stop caring. We miss you. If you need to talk you have my ear and my heart.

I know God. I'm not 'saved' or what one would call a devoted follower. But Bluey I talk to Him daily and I know that He listens. I know He listens. And I know He will test you and even if you fail He'll still be there for you. At times it may not seem that way . . .but in time His actions will prove so.

Again, we miss you . . .you've made sure no one can reach out to you and that's your choice, but know that you can reach out to me.

[thymeoperator]

i don't know if not caring is always a bad thing. sometimes it's like...you're okay enough with things not to care what else goes on. the rest doesn't matter, because you're solid within yourself.

[wally wonder]

i think it matters, caring, and what you do about it. one thing that troubled me when i read this (re-read, actually) is that paul could have changed the outcome for that french fella, forget his name, but he was the guy who the mouse was looking for. he was pals w/the mouse.

and when they did him, i think paul could have done something to change the outcome. he could have said, hey whoa now, that fool (that other guy, the idiot, forgot his name, too) but he was the one who was supposed to wet the sponge, didn't, cause he was an a$$hole. but paul could have done something. did paul get to the point where he didn't care? paul cared. why didn't he do something? he could have. he could have stopped it and done something. troublesome.

or is it a matter of all that stuff weighing you down. carrying a heavy load, boss. and you get to the point where the weight is just too much. so you go along to get along. no easy answers, are there?

[ShootDaSquirrells]

God cares he just works in mysterious ways. Paul just doesn't understand. Coffey himself said he wanted to go because there is too much hatred in the world and all. Coffey was suffering on Earth so God took him.

Anyways, not caring is too prevalent in the world to look at that as something prevalent or symbolic. I think stephen king just liked that phrase to describe while he wrote the book.

[Bryan James]

Crane wrote some good stuff, but this is the most appropriate for this thread:

A man said to the universe:
"Sir I exist!"
"However," replied the universe,
"The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation."
-- Stephen Crane

In other words, "Good for you, do what you will...I don't care. I might not even watch too much of it. Maybe I'll check in at halftime."

BJS