Alice Munro’s “How I Met My Husband”: The Many Lives We Could Live by Katie Pauls

In Alice Munro’s “How I Met My Husband” life’s lessons, setbacks and successes all come together in one summer when Edie, the main character, begins her quest to find herself. At the ripe age of fifteen, she is constantly influenced by the world around her, even more so since she is away from home for the first time. Edie comes from a farm life, and does not seem to have much of a future ahead of her. She did not do well in high school, and her grades and her father decide that it was not for her. That is not to say she is not intelligent, though. She continuously demonstrates throughout the story that she grasps the major concepts of life, sometimes even better than her employers. For instance, she can tell the difference between “country folk” and “non-country folk.” She works as the “hired-girl” in the Peebles residence, and finds her new surroundings impressive. The Peebles home draws a striking contrast to and her family's farm. With the exposure to other worlds, she broadens her horizons, and ultimately “tries on” different lives as she searches for herself.
Edie’s quest begins the summer she takes the job at the Peebles’ home. “It was just when the trend was starting of town people buying up old farms, not to work them but to live on them” (125). To Edie this way of life is exotic and full of luxury—she is amazed by the automatic washer and dryer and the décor of the bathroom (127, 128). She knows she could enjoy living that way, without the hassle of “barn work” (127). Yet though she experiences wonderment at the Peebles’ home, Edie recognizes her upbringing and does not shy away from it. Edie constantly refers back to her mother and the manner in which things were done on the farm. For example, her mother would say, “have a house without a pie, be ashamed until you die,” but according to Edie Mrs. Peebles “operated differently” (126). Edie knows the significance of hard work in a person’s life and does not look down on it.
Even though Edie distinguishes the difference between herself and Mrs. Peebles, she cannot resist the temptation to live as the Peebles’ do. As Mrs. Peebles and her children leave Edie alone for an afternoon, she grabs the golden opportunity. She takes the dress that she has been “hungering to see the rest” of from Mrs. Peebles’s closet (128). “Next thing was easy. I got out of my own things and slipped it on” (128). At this moment, Edie begins experimenting, trying to find her niche in life. She sheds the old Edie as she does her clothes and tries on a new Edie. From the moment the satin dress she situates and admires herself, Edie becomes swept up in the possibilities and opportunities that come with the elegance and luxury of the Peebles’ life. She piles her hair up on her head “to get the effect” then applies Mrs. Peebles’s makeup (128). She metamorphoses into a more sophisticated Edie. Caught up in the identity, she goes downstairs to refresh herself with some ice and ginger ale, as the Peebleses would have done (129). The pretense of another life might have continued for a while longer had Chris Watters not startled her out of her reverie.
After the crash of reality brought upon her by Chris’s request for water, Edie realizes that Mrs. Peebles’s life is not for her and quietly returns to her hired-girl regime. She puts the dress back and finishes her chores, and ashamed for being caught in the act, goes to Chris to ask him not to tell on her. Until the arrival of Alice Kelling, there is no other introduction of a female character in the story, save for one, the loathsome bother, Loretta Bird. Yet Edie does not take any interest in Loretta’s life. From the beginning of the story, it is obvious that Edie places herself above Loretta, and therefore feels no temptation to pursue that possibility. Throughout the story Edie steadfastly reminds the reader that the Peebleses cannot tell the difference between real country folk, like herself, and the pretenders, such as Loretta Bird.
Alice Kelling’s life, on the other hand, does represent success. “[Y]ou could tell from how she talked she was from the city, or educated, or both” (133). Like Mrs. Peebles, Alice Kelling lives a life apart from the one Edie has grown up with. Alice has attended and finished school, something that Edie did not manage to accomplish. She exudes different possibilities, as well, especially with the announcement that she is Chris’s fiancée (133). The fact that Alice is chasing after him, a man who peppered even Edie with handsome compliments, speaks for his character. By baking the crumb cake and taking it to Chris, Edie enters the world of Alice Kelling. Before heading out to see him, she hesitates and cleans herself up, but decides to go sans makeup for fear that it will remind him of the dress incident—the time when she was someone else. Chris responds by giving her just a small taste of what he could offer her in her new role as the Alice character. Like Alice, she too is oblivious to his painfully obvious hints that he will not commit himself to just her. Edie as Alice wants the elusive pilot and will faithfully wait for him to be hers, and her life quickly gives way to a routine of traveling, waiting and finding disappointment. The only difference is that Edie travels as far as the mailbox to greet her disillusionment.
Expectation slowly fades as it dawns on her that a letter will never find its way to the Peebles’ home. Edie becomes the tired-looking Alice Kelling she sees when Alice first arrives, “[n]othing in the least pretty or even young-looking about her” (133). She comprehends all too slowly that Alice’s life is not as glamorous as it once looked; that going after the mysterious and ever elusive pilot is not in the least bit worthwhile. “Till it came to me one day there were women doing this with their lives, all over” (140). The sad insight that she will continue the habit of venturing to the mailbox unsettles her and she tells herself she “was never made to go on like that (140). And so she rejects Alice Kelling’s life.
But, if she is not suited to be a Mrs. Peebles or an Alice Kelling, then who is she? Edie wants to be successful; she wants to know that she means something to someone. She does not want to have the label of the “hired-girl” all her life. Edie believes there are two kinds of women: those who wait all their life and those who do not (140). Edie declares herself the second kind, and she will no longer wait passively for or chase after any man or success. Carmichael, the mailman, proves himself worthy by seeking her out. Because he is the opposite of Chris Watters, she accepts his attentions and they are eventually married with children and live in a house with all the novelties she once admired. By the end of the story, Edie finally settles on the life that is right for her. She has crossed over from a lost teenager to a young lady on her journey toward adulthood. But she would not have discovered who she was had she not lived through that summer on her own, as an impressionable girl of fifteen watching and measuring the lives of the women around her.


Works Cited


Munro, Alice. "How I Met My Husband." Perrine's Literature : Structure, Sound, and Sense. By Thomas R. Arp and Greg Johnson. Boston: Heinle, 2008. 125-140.