The last of the three books we hear about is Suzanne of the Aspens. On page 265, Kate gives Suzanne of the Aspens to Smithy, telling him it is an appropriate book for him. Smithy says "It was a fat book, and I hoped I would like it." On the next page he starts telling us about Suzanne of the Aspens. It is a true story of Suzanne Bowen, who left Boston with her husband, Captain John Bowen and their son, John Jr. The cross the country with a wagon train to settle in California. When Captain John gets sick, the other settlers think it s smallpox, so the Bowens are forced to leave the wagon train. Captain John dies that night in middle of nowhere. Suzanne and John Jr. buy the captain, and they start back towards the wagon train but they get lost and John Jr. gets really sick and dies the next morning. At this point, Smithy stops reading for the night.
He resumes his book on page 274 on the evening of his first day in the bike tour thing. For the second time in three days Suzanne had to bury a loved one and it was driving her crazy. For several days she lay over the grave of her dead son, not moving. Finally with the wagon horses starving and thirsty, she realized that no matter how much she willed him back, John Jr. was gone. Something inside her made her start doing the things she would need to do to survive in the Rockies alone. She got her act together and started preparing for the winter. She built a house and a stove for herself. She stockpiled wood and and started to ration her food.
Just like Suzanne, Smithy lost all of his relatives in a very short amount of time. He feels very depressed and is unable to cope with the situation. Something, however, pulls him together, just like something made Suzanne start preparing for the Winter. Although they start their journeys at different times in the story, they still traveled roughly the same path (from the New England to Colorado). Once again we see a connection, but Smithy is actually picking up on it this time. He says he is not sure if the book is really about him.
Snow fell every day and elk ate part of her firewood store. She claims that this "state of grace" was what led her to survive. She is shy towards the Indians, who are always watching her, but she showed no fear. She often left them small offerings, and in return she was often left with a feather.
Like Smithy, she is willing to help strangers, who may seem scary, but she doesn't show fear. We get many examples of Smithy's selflessness, just like Suzanne's.
We don't hear much more about Suzanne of the Aspens for a while until page 329. She sees two old Indians walking in the snow, and she wants to help them, but they turn and run away. She was confused. Unfortunately page 329 is the last page that contains any material about Suzanne of the Aspens, but nonetheless, we got a pretty good sense for the story, and saw some similarities to Smithy's journey.
Smithy encounters numerous people along his journey, and says more than once that "people are great." It's sort of hard to categorize him as shy, he's more like.. awkward. But, he doesn't talk a lot and never really knows what to do or how to interact with people so in that way he is similar to Suzanne
ReplyDeleteIn her endurance of suffering and persistence in the face of loneliness and uncertain odds, Suzanne in many ways represents Smithy's newly emerging ideal. The mere fact that she doesn't "feel sorry for herself" resonates strongly with him.
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