how it was

"She seemed unaware that she lived in a time when love killed women" (55). 

In thinking about our theme of region, it seems there is no room for love to take root on the American frontier in Proulx's "Them Old Cowboy Songs."  Despite Rose's efforts to fight against the hardening effects of pioneer life, she and Archie quickly "[shift] out of days of clutching love and into the long haul of married life" (57).  But this haul proves too heavy to carry.  Even Archie feels the pain brought on by love.  He feels "like [he has] been shot" after Rose asserts her sexual desire for her husband.  Strangers, too, are privy to the inappropriateness of love on the frontier.  Sink, who knows little about Archie's home life, portends Archie's "life already too complicated to live" (67).  And indeed it is.  Rose's failed pregnancy and Archie's work-induced illness are unsuccessful attempts to improve their married life on the frontier.  Eventually, their efforts end in their deaths.  But in the end, no one cares: "Some lived and some died, and that's how it was" (77).

What does the frontier's rejection of love reveal about the region and its role in the lives of those old cowboys in this story?