Springfield, Massachusetts
Good Morning, Midnight (Reginald Hill Edition)Springfield, Massachusetts, was the longest place the narrator’s family stayed during a childhood repeatedly redirected by his father’s sudden decisions. They lived there in a trailer park initially described as temporary; it became the nearest thing the family had to permanence, and the setting for the narrator’s transition from expecting to leave as soon as he could to being told he would continue his education.
Setting and Length of Residence
The narrator was fourteen when the family moved to Springfield. Their home was a trailer in a park, and his father presented the arrangement as temporary, lasting only until they found something better. In retrospect, that promise becomes an irony of duration: this was the place where the family came closest to settling. Springfield stands apart from the abrupt moves that had shaped the narrator’s childhood, even though it was never explicitly declared permanent.
School and the Decision to Stay
At school in Springfield, the narrator did well, but assumed he would leave as soon as he was able and get a job. His father unexpectedly overturned that expectation by deciding that he would stay on and go to college. The decision came without explanation or debate, in keeping with the father’s established manner of making up his mind. Springfield was therefore not only a comparatively long-lived home but also the place where the narrator’s immediate future was redirected toward higher education.
The Planned Move to Hartford
By the time the narrator was seventeen and nearing eighteen, he was preparing to begin college in Hartford, Connecticut. That destination was his father’s choice: he said there was work there and intended to move the family as well. The parents were killed when their truck pulled onto the interstate, before the narrator’s account describes that proposed family move taking place. In the aftermath, the narrator told others he would live with his aunt in Hartford as planned, turning an earlier arrangement for college into a permanent one after his parents’ deaths. Springfield’s significance lies in this contrast: it was the family’s closest approach to staying put, while the next intended move became part of the loss that ended the narrator’s childhood there.
