I Believe I Can Touch the Sky

OK so here I am in my house reading this new book we got called Song of Solomon and I think to myself, "What should I blog about?" After reading a few pages, I get to the part where they talk about Mr. Smith the insurance agent and his suicide and thats when I began to think about the whole notion of flying and believing that you could actually fly...

Our class is centered around traveling (hence "Literature in Motion") and I think that there is probably some connection between this guy deciding that he could actually fly and the whole idea that when you travel and come out of your comfort zone and quotidian routine, then you're able to learn more about yourself as a person.

The narrator of the novel tells us that "None of them (the people of the city) had suspected he (Mr. Smith) had it in him" (Morrison 9). According to this, Mr. Smith had no crazy habits and never really did anything out of the ordinary and because of this, no one had expected that he would suddenly pull some crazy stunt. As I think about Mr. Smith and his belief that he could fly, I asked myself, "what would Mr. Smith gain by flying?" Perhaps he was tired of his life and wanted to free himself from his responsibilities. Maybe he had somewhere to go, someone to meet... Maybe he was trying to get to know himself or he might have even felt that by flying he could change himself.

Its interesting that Morrison would begin her novel this way, with something so complicated and curious as a suicide (specially this one with its bizarre qualities). Maybe some of the characters in the novel will have to face the same obstacles that Mr. Smith may have had to face? Or maybe they might even ask themselves the same questions that led Mr. Smith to believe he could fly? I look forward to seeing how Morrison is going to play with this idea of flying.