"Sonny's Blues" response

There were a number of aspects of the story “Sonny’s Blues” that I definitely identified with, and I very much enjoyed the story and some of the realms of human experience that were touched. As a musician myself, I have always been amazed by other musicians of all kinds: jazz, blues, rock, classical, bluegrass, fusion, you name it! And I do find it interesting that it seems as if the subject of drug use in the realm of music is never that far off when venturing into conversation about it. It seems as if the justification for the use of drugs in music, by a lot of musicians anyway, is that it can help to get the mind off its normal pattern of behavior; its normal way of thinking. You can begin to approach the music in many ways you had never even thought of before, whether it’s just something a lot simpler than you normally play or something with way over the top energy.

Here's a video that briefly explores the influence of drugs on some of music's more popular figures:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JI-9nubE6H0

 Unfortunately, so many musicians have died due to complications of drug use and it really does paint a picture of struggling artists coping with their own uncertainty by getting high and escaping from having to think about life and all of its troubles. As a person who has dealt with heroin addiction in my own family, I can say from seeing it first-hand that it is a nasty addiction that can tear at you for years and years even after “kicking it.” I have to say, reading this story was really pulling at a lot of emotions for me. I definitely identified with it, and I definitely identify with not having really a picture perfect life that has been mostly bright and shiny; there have been a lot of dark moments. Perhaps that is why I’m particularly fond of the blues (one of my favorite musicians, Jimi Hendrix, was a psychedelic pioneer of blues rock), and I can recognize the pain, suffering, and experience that it takes to really create something that can move people.  I feel like the story was almost implying that some suffering is necessary in order to make emotional music, and I came to that conclusion because of Sonny's statement "I won't die trying not to suffer. At least, not any faster than anybody else." (Booth 95) Sonny's brother wants more than anything to keep him from suffering, but it's almost as if Sonny recognizes that the suffering is what got him to where he was at in the first place. I would tend to agree that without some difficult life experiences it would be pretty difficult to truly play and feel blues songs. Here's a link to a blues song that I've always really enjoyed:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1TxpIrwkSk

Works Cited

Booth, Alison, and Kelly Mays, ed. The Norton Introduction To Literature. 10th ed. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2011. 75-101. Print.



Cathedral by Raymond Carver

I'm not really sure what is expected in terms of format so I'm just going to go for it and hope that that's acceptable. When initially beginning "Cathedral" I wasn't sure what to expect. Judging by the name I honestly thought it was going to be something completely different than what it was. My initial feeling towards the narrator wasn't really a positive one. He seemed to be generally disinterested and apathetic towards anything having to do with his wife (that didn't have to do with him, that is) and seemed to hold some pretty petty ideas about certain things. I thought that it was especially petty when he was discussing the prospect of a blind man marrying a woman and never being able to see her, as if looks and looks alone are what validate a loving relationship. It seemed like the idea of a genuine love with disregard to physicality was lost upon this guy. Also, the narrator had no real desire to care enough to even remember names. When discussing his wife's former childhood sweetheart he even blatantly asks "why should he have a name?" (Booth 33) implying how little he actually cares about that person's significance in his wife's life. Even after learning Robert's name he insisted on calling him "the blind man" as if he was some inhuman being that was so vastly different and needed constant labeling. But I did like that as the two were able to spend more alone time together they both ventured into each other's worlds in a way. Robert enjoyed smoking marijuana for the first time with the narrator, and was open minded and welcoming when asked about it. Then, the narrator began trying to describe a cathedral, and as they began to draw a cathedral together (in order to better explain what one looks like) the narrator finds himself outside of his general perspective of reality and in that of Robert's. His eyes are closed, he's "taking in" the cathedral that he just drew, and he's beginning to empathize with Robert just as the story ends. I did enjoy that, and it honestly reminded me of meditation and the peace that shutting out the external world and focusing inward can bring. To help give you an idea of what this feels like, here's a link to a guided meditation on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zh-klfBJlHc

Works Cited

 

Booth, Alison, and Kelly Mays, ed. The Norton Introduction To Literature. 10th ed. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2011. 32-44. Print.