Dust (Symbol)
The pervasive dust in Out of the Dust is a symbol of despair—the complete absence of hope. In the novel, Billie Jo's father's wheat farm was once profitable and thriving. But when years of drought, unsustainable farming practices, and massive wind storms lead to topsoil eroding and becoming airborne, dust blankets the Great Plains region and gets into the farmers' homes and food. Throughout the book, Hesse depicts how brief moments of joy and hope are extinguished by yet another dust storm. Hesse further develops the dust's symbol significance by showing how the amount of dust the family must deal with directly tracks with the the Kelby family's feelings of hopelessness. During one dust storm, Billie Jo struggles to walk home from the theater in dust so thick she can't see her feet. Upon reaching home, she discovers her father has gone out to find her, and he doesn't return until several hours later. In this symbolic scene, Hesse highlights how the despair in which both characters are engulfed is making it impossible for them to connect, no matter how hard they try to "find" each other. Billie Jo repeats her desire to get "out of the dust" until she finally leaves town on a boxcar headed west. However, the journey shows Billie Jo that the dust isn't something from which she can run away. Because despair will always be with her, she discovers that she must confront her feelings of hopelessness and learn to be optimistic again. In this way, Hesse alters the meaning of the phrase "out of the dust," making the dust—i.e. despair—not something Billie Jo gets away from but something that has shaped her being.
Billie Jo's Injured Hands (Symbol)
Billie Jo's injured hands serve as a symbol of guilt. From early in the book, Hesse emphasizes the importance of Billie Jo's piano playing. When Billie Jo accidentally throws a pail of burning kerosene at her mother, she suffers severe burns to her hands while desperately trying to put out the flames on her mother's pregnant body. Billie Jo feels the weight of her guilt when her heavily bandaged hands make it difficult to carefully give water to her dehydrated mother. After Ma dies, Hesse underscores the symbolic connection between piano playing, Ma's memory, and Billie Jo's hands when Billie Jo won't attempt to play piano. When she finally does, she finds that she can't play nearly as well as she used to. Eventually, however, Doc Rice encourages Billie Jo to use her hands if she wants them to heal properly. At the climax of the novel, Billie Jo overcomes some of the guilt she feels regarding her mother's death as she forgives herself and her father. Having done so, Billie Jo returns to practicing piano every morning to make the scarred skin stretch over her bones as her hands return to normal.
Ma's Piano (Symbol)
The piano Ma keeps in the family home is a symbol of joy. Billie Jo comments that her father gave Ma the piano as a gift when they first married; Billie Jo enjoys watching her mother impress Bayard with her piano playing because it is a reprieve from the couple bickering over household finances. When massive dust storms blow through the county, the dust gets into the house and into the piano, dampening the sound of the hammers hitting the strings. This symbolizes the way any joy in the family home is snuffed out by the unstoppable dust. Similarly, Billie Jo avoids playing the piano after Ma's death because she senses the inappropriateness of engaging in a joyful activity while in mourning. However, the joy returns to the Kelby household when Bayard and Billie Jo work through their conflicts with each other and with themselves. Bayard gets Ma's piano cleaned and tuned, making it possible for Billie Jo to fill the house with music and happiness again.
Bayard's Pond (Symbol)
The pond that Billie Jo's father digs following Ma's death is a symbol of humility and deference. When Ma is still alive, she encourages Bayard to dig a pond in their yard so that they will have a reserve of water for their withered crops. Bayard stubbornly refuses, insisting that a pond will seep back into the earth faster than he can fill it from the well, which he doesn't want to risk depleting. After Ma dies, however, Bayard soon begins digging the giant hole, attracting the attention of locals. Commenting on Bayard's untreated cancerous growths, Billie Jo says: "My father’s digging his own grave, he calls it a pond, but I know what he’s up to. He is rotting away, like his father, ready to leave me behind in the dust." But contrary to what she suspects, Bayard completes the pond and fills it with water, creating an oasis in the middle of their arid farm. Regretful that he didn't build the pond when Ma asked, Bayard humbly relinquishes his stubbornness and shows respect for Ma's memory by creating something that will sustain them for years.
Ma's Apple Trees (Symbol)
The pair of apple trees that Ma plants in the family's yard symbolize optimism through adversity. Billie Jo explains that her mother planted the apple boughs when she and Bayard were first married. Through a decade and a half of drought, she keeps the particularly thirsty trees alive and bearing green apples. This symbol of optimism through adversity is attacked when grasshoppers eat every leaf and piece of fruit on the same day that Ma dies. Billie Jo finds that she is powerless to keep the grasshoppers away from the tree, just as she is powerless to save her mother. But despite this grim moment, later in the novel Billie Jo reports that the pond holds enough water to keep the apple trees alive. Louise also honors Ma's memory by arranging apples in a bowl on the shelf next to her book of poetry.
