Even though a person likes to think they are in control, life will show them that they have less control than they thought. In "Good Country People" by Flannery O'Connor, the character Hulga is a person who wants to maintain control over every aspect of her life, good or bad. To Hulga, it seems like she is constantly in control of her environment and her life. However, she doesn't have the control she thinks she does. Hulga's birth name was Joy. When Joy/Hulga was 21, she wanted to show her mother she was in control by changing her name. Elizabeth Hubbard states that Hulga "triumphs in her self-name not only because it allows her to gain a sense of power over her mother, but also because she feels that she has, in some sense, been created herself” (58). Besides, Hulga knew there was nothing her mother could do about it. However, Hulga did not have control by changing her name, it was an act of rebellion against her mother. Changing her name didn't stop Hulga's mother from calling her Joy. One scholar states, “Despite all she has done to free herself and create herself as a figure of powerful will, she also continues to be the child her mother lost” (Arbery 45). Therefore, Hulga once again lost control. Hulga is thirty-two years old and still lives at home with her mother. Hulga is not in control of her life. She is heavily dependent on her mother and uses her disability as a crutch to try to maintain control over her mother, she thinks. Hulga was born with a weak heart, and at the age of ten she lost her leg in an accident. Hulga couldn't control the accident that caused her to lose her leg and replace it with an artificial leg. "For Hulga, the artificial leg is indeed the only real part of her, since it is a manufactured thing...... middle of paper ...... April 2014.Behiling, Laura L. "The Necessity of Disability in “Good Country People” and “The Lame Shall Enter First.” Flannery O’Connor Review 4 (2006): 88-89. MLA International Bibliography. April 2, 2014. “Chickens.” without wings": "The good people of the country" and the seduction of nihilism. Flannery O'Connor Review 2 (2003): 63-73. International Bibliography MLA. April 2, 2014. Gayman, Cynthia. hope of recognition: the morality of perception." Journal of Speculative Philosophy 25.2 (2011): 148-60. MLA International Bibliography. Internet. April 2, 2014. Hubbard, Elizabeth. "Blindness and the beginning of vision among the "good people of the Countryside." Flannery O'Connor Review 9 (2011): 53-68. MLA International Bibliography. April 2, 2014. O'Connor, "Good Country People." 'Connor. New York: Farrar, 1972. 271-91. Print.