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What does it mean to have an irrepressible impulse to fly away from the people who love you---to abandon them for a mission that can only ever be solitary; more than that, one from which you might never return (at least, not in one piece)?
Early in the film, watching Joe take off---her first time seeing one of the men at Barranca in action---Bonnie Lee (Jean Arthur) says: "It's the most wonderful thing I've ever seen." The head of the airmail service, Geoff (Cary Grant), caustically replies: "Yes, it probably reminded you of a great big beautiful bird, didn't it?" Bonnie's response captures it all: "No, it didn't at all---that's why it's so wonderful. It's really a flying human being." Geoff gives her a knowing look (the first time we see him let his guard down; "she gets it", he's thinking). "Well, you're right about one thing: a bird would have too much sense to try to fly in that kind of muck."
As far as I'm aware, human beings are the only animals on Earth to have invented the idea of God. We're also the only ones who know, with certainty, that we're going to die---again, at least as far as I'm aware (maybe if we knew how to ask, we'd learn more about the consciousnesses of other beings---but that's a discussion for another time). Aristotle defined the human being as the "rational" animal, but I think Geoff has the better idea: we're the only ones insane enough to try to fly, despite the weather, despite the muck, and despite the fact that we don't have wings. Why did Icarus fly too close to the sun? One possible answer: he wanted it too much. The better answer, though, is that there's no real answer at all: he just couldn't help himself. After watching Joe crash and die, Bonnie asks "the Kid" why he flies: "I've been in it 22 years, Miss Lee. I couldn't give you an answer that'd make any sense."
And yet, human beings also need each other---desperately. We cry when someone dies. Lee's open vulnerability after Joe's death is a threat to the camaraderie of the Barranca men, but it's the natural response. It's "Dutchy"'s feeling too, and the feeling of the man who comforts and encourages Bonnie after her cold ousting from the group. The men---in particular, Geoff---are only hard because they have to be. It's their line of work---there's nothing else they can do.
Has there ever been more human feeling packed into a single shot than in the shot of Bonnie taking over from Geoff's "corny", stilted piano playing? Bonnie knows better now---she's learned how these men mourn. Bonnie starts to play a sad song before Geoff stops her, and she snaps out of the past---"Who's Joe?" "Never heard of him."
"Peeeaaanuuuuts!"
Human beings have to be hidden from each other. There's too much flying through our heads all the time: too much sadness and grief over the ones we've lost; too much passion and love for the people we want to stay a little longer; too much desire to be away from all of it, to fly off to what I like to call, following John Green's model, "Cheyenne, Wyoming". We need art, or God, or at least something to do with all our time. The only thing we can do for each other is figure out some way of expressing all of it without burning up or burning someone else. Should I stay, or should I leave? The answer is always both: it's a coin flip (it's always out of our hands), but one that always comes up heads (it's always up to us).