Alexies Flight free essay sample

Officer or Angel A theme of Sherman Alexies Flight is constant change, instability, and violence. The protagonist, Zits, has been shuffled from foster home to foster home since his mother passed and father abandoned him. The homes and people that Zits has been forced into are all unfamiliar. The only place that gives Zits stability and comfort is, oddly, jail. With that, the only person constantly in his life is Officer Dave, a city police officer who has arrested Zits multiple times. Officer Daves is the Juxtaposition to the capricious and magical events of Zits life. Zits has very little in his life. Almost nothing in his life is consistent, IVe lived in twenty different foster homes and attended twenty-two different schools. I own only two pairs of pants and three shirts and four pairs of underwear and one baseball hat and three pairs of socks and three paperback novels and the photographs of my mother and father (Alexie, 7). We will write a custom essay sample on Alexies Flight or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Being tossed from place to place, Zits cannot even recognize where he wakes up in the morning and does not care. He is used to the feeling of instability, therefore he doesnt even try to obtain stability. Instability is his norm and instability, ironically, is the only constant to Zits, which is the reason he acts out. There are no repercussions for his actions. The consequence is a change of scenery, which is a good thing and familiar to Zits. Change is something that Zits can count on. To have the familiarity of change, Zits needs to act out. He resorts to violence and recognizes it; l get into arguments and fistfights with everybody. I get so angry that I go blind and deaf and mute (Alexie, 8). At first, his aggressive behavior seems to come out of inner frustration. However, we soon find that with little control over his own life, the government can put me wherever they want, (Alexie, 9), violence is the only thing in his life that he has complete control of. With no say in where he is placed, behavior is something that is completely up to Zits. Violence is also Zits defense mechanism. With no parents, little say in his life, and thinking that when it comes to foster parents, there are only two kinds (Alexie, 8), his violence is a fuck you to the world. He is rebelling against the bad hand he was dealt. Yet oddly, he befriends Officer Dave who is the fgure of Justice and protects people from violence. Zits doesnt waste his time trying to remember the names of [his] new foster parents (Alexie, 8). Zits does not want anything to do with things that are temporary. In contrast, he easily identifies Officer Dave by voice. The knowledge of names determines whether Zits deems a person worthy of acknowledgement in his life. If he thinks or wants a person to be permanent in his life then he will remember their name, such as Edgar and Officer Dave. For Zits to know Officer Daves name and recognize his voice is ignificant and shows how much Officer Dave means to Zits. Also, Zits has identified himself as Zits since the beginning of the novel and he has not hinted at his actual name. His acne and life blemishes have always defined him. It was not until Officer Dave welcomed Zits into his family that Zits revealed his name. This further indicates how Officer Dave has impacted Zits life. Officer Dave exposes the two sides of Zits life and has successfully pulled Zits to the right one. Zits has finally succeeded in finding his name. When telling his foster mother his name, Zits changes to the person he ants to be. Zits is ready to rid his past and start new by expelling his nickname. Officer Dave is someone that is also a constant in Zits life. Zits craves consistency as much as he seems to reject it. Zits is comforted by Officer Dave even though Officer Dave is essentially the opposite of what Zits stands for. Officer Dave is the nice, understanding, and model citizen that Zits never was. Yet Zits still finds security in him, even in the height of his violence, l recognized his voice I trust, him not to hurt me, so I calm down a little (Alexie, 17). Zits may act out for the regularity of change nd the presence of Office Dave. With the familiarity of Officer Dave, is Jail, which a familiar place that Zits has visited many times. This further proves that Zits wants some persistence in his life. If he is willing to go to Jail for this desire, then he has gone to extremes and is willing scrap the bottom of the barrel to get the minimum. Zits comfort in the familiarity of Jail results in a friend. Who would have thought that somewhere as awful as Jail could produce a friendship? Zits takes the worst place to finding someone who amazes him and couldnt find someone who can talk like im (Alexie, 26). The familiarity of Jail gives Zits the positive experience that allows him to make a friend. However, his friend, Justice, did not make a positive short-term impact on Zits life. With such a name, one would think that Justice would urge Zits to make Just decisions, but ironically he does the opposite. It may have been Justices intention to send Zits into that bank to have an epiphany about the direction of his life. In which case, Justices name would suit him. In comparison, Officer Dave is unquestionably a staple of the law and Justice. He is also the practical, positive, and eal role model, unlike the questionable presence of Zits that compliments the magical realism of portion of the novel. A major advancer of the novel is magical realism. It, again, changed Zits time period, setting, and person, in order to show Zits his history and the different perspectives of violence. After the exhausting and enlightening experience, Zits goes to Officer Dave to confess and repent, l respect you Im raising my hands up because I have two guns inside my coat (Alexie, 163). The fact that Zits nonchalantly goes to Officer Dave after a life changing experience hows how comfortable Zits is with someone who is always present in his life. Officer Dave presents the realistic and practical extremity to the magical elements of the novel. He is the normal, complacent, civil role model that Zits needs. Officer Dave is the voice of reason in the mess that is Zits life. He is the rock that Zits clings to. Officer Dave provides the stability that Zits never had and Zits has recognized it. Some may see them as an odd duo, but they compliment each other. Officer Dave is Zits yin to his yang. They balance each other out. Officer Dave is a major character hat highlights the extremes of the spectrum. When there is erraticism, he is the unchanging staple that Zits counts on and turns to. If violence breaks out, Officer Dave is the calming and authoritative fgure that keeps Zits in line. After the overwhelming magical trip Zits experienced, he came back to Officer Dave who provided the pragmatic view on life. Officer Dave is the salvation that Zits needed. Like magical realism, Officer Dave is the major advancer of the novel and saved Zits from himself. Alexie, Sherman. Flight: A Novel. New York: Black Cat, 2007. Print.