In the short story “The Girl Who Left Her Sock on the Floor,” Deborah Eisenberg writes from Francie’s point of view. This young college girl lives a regular life: she fights with her roommate; she goes to classes and smokes behind the buildings. Then one day, she discovers that her mother has died at the hospital.
The plot is not the most original one, but the story is interesting because it creates a kind of a loop. In the beginning, we follow the story of this young girl who has to deal with the disappearance of her mother, who is the only parent she ever knew. The author emphasizes the fact that young people are sometimes really harsh on their parents and don’t realize that they are also mortal. The description and the fact that the story is written from the main character’s point of view give the reader a lot of insights about the process of grieving at a young age. Then we explore a phase of wandering, and it shows how it is complicated to face the death of a parent but also how people can have a lack of sensitivity towards a dead’s loved ones.
Meanwhile, we follow the quest of Francie as she goes to New-York City to find her dad, who she had previously thought was dead. She met people along the way, and we get to read her fears but also her expectations and how she handles this journey. The fact that the character is comparing herself all the time to her mother is striking and puts the reader into the process of grieving but also remembering a parent not only for his/her qualities. The story ends with Francie who is waiting for her father to come back to his home; she is in the hall and the prose is not too filled with pathos; it sounds realistic and we understand that this marks the new beginning of something else. The rhythm, for instance, changes in the last paragraph: the sentences are shorter with just one proposition, and it creates this effect of being short of breath.
The death of her mother is finally not an end but the beginning of the main character’s journey, and the meeting with her father is not a beginning but the end of her wandering phase.