Character Analysis
Like the song says, all you need is love, right? Bud certainly does. He misses his momma and wishes he knew his dad. He's not getting much love in either the orphanage or any of his foster homes, so what does he do? He takes his life into his own hands and goes out to look for a way to live that isn't awful, despite the fact that it's a tough world out there, especially for kids, and especially during the Great Depression.
Bud's a good kid, but he's a complicated person. Let's look at some of the things that make him such an interesting character to read about.
The Sweet Pea
Yup, Bud really is a sweet pea. As far as sweetness goes, Bud doesn't change that much in this story—he's pretty great from start to finish—but his overall attitude and the way he thinks about happiness definitely change for the better as the story goes on. By the end of the book, Bud is all smiles and excitement and happiness, and he's earned it by being so persistent in his search for happiness.
Now, even if he is a sweet kid, the road isn't easy for Bud. He may have some wisdom and some wits, but under it all, he's still a little boy. He's out in the world doing adult things and taking care of himself, but just like any other kid, he gets scared, makes mistakes, and sometimes lets his imagination get away with him. Take this moment, for example:
On the side of the box some big red letters said as clear as anything, URGENT: CONTAINS HUMAN BLOOD!!! […] The only kind of people who would carry human blood around in a car were vampires! (10.80-82)
Now, we're pretty sure there are no vampires in Flint, Michigan, but Bud knows what he saw—or at least he thinks he does. At times like these, Bud reveals how young he is, and it's endearing. We begin to really like Bud and empathize with him. Since this book is written in the first person (using the word "I"), it can be easy to forget Bud's age, since he seems so smart and observant most of the time. On top of that, if we remember that Bud is a little kid, we worry about him all the more as he takes off on his own. It's a dangerous world out there for a little kid.
Liar, Liar
Bud's pants must be on fire. Can you believe how much he lies? Is this a good thing? Bud certainly thinks so, at least some of the time. Think about it: if he didn't lie sometimes, Bud would probably be starving—or a lot worse.
Bud has survival down to a science. Just look at any one of his Rules and Things for Having a Funner Life and Making a Better Liar out of Yourself. Bud lies to survive. For example, when he wakes up from the best sleep he's had in years and doesn't remember where he is, he follows his rule number twenty-nine, the one that says, "When you wake up and don't know for sure where you're at…it's best to pretend you're still asleep until you can figure out what's going on and what you should do" (11.73).
Bud does learn some helpful things by following this rule, but then he feels uncomfortable and has to hurry up and pretend to wake up. So it seems like lying, even if it's to survive, makes Bud feel kind of bad. He feels like he has to do it, but he's not always happy about it.
Bud's lies aren't always successful, but he keeps telling them in order to make himself feel stronger. Take the scene when Bud is hungry and runs to get in the food line at the mission only to find that the line closed. He tries to lie to be let into the line, but the man acting like security for the shelter won't even let him speak (6.13). Bud just keeps going even when the situation seems impossible. It's that kind of perseverance that gets him to the finish line, but it also gets him into some sticky situations, like this one.
Lying is the kind of thing we all do every now and then, but deep down we know it's wrong. How do we feel about Bud when he does it? Do we feel like he is doing something wrong? Well, one way to think about lying in Bud, Not Buddy is to think about what tools homeless kids have to use to survive. Kids are smaller than adults and more vulnerable to bad people, they can't get a job to make money to eat, and they're usually dependent in all ways. So, how can Bud take care of himself out in the big world? Lying becomes a tool he doesn't enjoy but relies on for survival.
Faith in a Stone
Bud gets pretty attached to things. In particular, he gets attached to things that remind him of his mother and her world: flyers (of the man he thinks must be his dad), rocks with weird words and numbers on them, the blanket he imagines still smells like home, and a strange photo of his mother as a girl. Holding on to these things and looking after them every day gives Bud faith that he will finally find his home.
This shows us, too, that Bud has a pretty active imagination. He likes to picture things and think about them. Sometimes his imagination gets away with him, like when he thinks he sees a bat, or when he thinks Lefty Lewis is a vampire.
But it's also Bud's imagination that helps him find Calloway. Bud is right when he thinks that his mother's flyers are a clue to the identity of a family member. It's not his father, but it is his grandfather on the flyer. It's also Bud's imagination and attention to detail that make him notice when Calloway picks up a rock and puts it in his pocket. Strange? Bud is curious and asks: "What in the Sam Hill are you going to do with a doggone rock?" (18.30). It's Bud's imagination that actually leads him to find out that Calloway is his only living family.
Comedy or Tragedy?
We don't know about you, but we think Bud is pretty hilarious. Some of the things he thinks up just hit your funny bone in the right kind of way. Remember what he says when something big and unexpected is about to happen?: "woop, zoop, sloop" and there it is. Then, when Lefty Lewis tells Bud he's really glad that Bud never learned how to drive, Bud says: "No, sir, but if you'da showed me some fangs I'da learned real quick" (11.18). Not bad for a little kid, huh? This shows us that Bud is pretty clever, especially for his age.
Being funny is also one way to make hard times seem not so bad. When Bud finds out that lying won't get him into the food line at the mission, and that a man might belt him for trying, he then finds a "giant warm hand wrap around my neck from behind," so he "looked up to see whose doggone hand was so doggone big and why they'd put it around my neck" (6.15). Here, Bud is dead serious but has a funny way of putting his concern that lightens the mood. Repeating the word "doggone" so many times is what makes this a line to laugh at rather than feel anxious about. It's one of Bud's techniques for survival.
Sweet Revenge
So, we know that Bud is sweet, and we know that he's clever. He's also really thoughtful. He doesn't necessarily always put others before himself, but he can see other people's perspectives, even in tough situations—like when Todd Amos beats him up, and Todd's parents lock him in the shed, and he gets stung by hornets and has to bust out of the window. Even though it's Todd's fault that all of that happened to Bud, Bud still manages to think, "I can't all the way blame Todd for giving me trouble, though. If I had a regular home with a mother and father I wouldn't be too happy about other kids living in my house either" (4.6).
That's not to say that Bud totally excuses the bully. He says: "Being unhappy about it is one thing, but torturing the kids who are there even though they don't want to be is another" (4.7) and off he goes to get some sweet revenge: making Todd pee in his bed, which will set off Mrs. Amos. Bud did, of course, have the chance to take a shotgun and finish off the whole family, but his revenge is even sweeter because A) He won't get into major trouble by doing it B) It is wicked funny and C) He really only gets back at Todd, the worst of them all. Way to go, Bud.
But let's go back to that bit about Bud being so understanding. Now, we don't know about you, but we'd definitely have a hard time thinking about why a bully was mean to us. The bully's the bad guy, after all, right? Bud knows that, but he also knows that people are complicated, and that even people who seem bad—like Calloway, for instance—might be bad because they're unhappy, or because something bad happened to them, or for some other reason.
Bud is understanding because he's been through a lot and because he's taken to heart the good lessons he's learned from people like his mother, Deza Malone, Lefty Lewis, and Miss Thomas. Sure, Bud is one smart cookie, but you could say it's his good heart that really gets keeps him safe along the way and allows him to finally find his new family and his new home.
Bud Caldwell (Calloway) Timeline