What are your feelings about the way the family turns from thinking about the boy to thinking about their own lives at the end of this poem?

In a post of about 200-250 words, what are your feelings about the way the family turns from thinking about the boy to thinking about their own lives at the end of this poem?

How does it make you feel? Do you have any sympathy for the way they behave? Is it part of living a tough life in a rural area around the turn of the century?