Into the Wild

so… yes… we bought a house.

More on that in a bit…

I just finished reading “Into the Wild” by Jon Krakauer – an account and commentary of the short life of Chris McCandless, recently dramatized in a movie of the same name.

To cut a long story short, McCandless was the kid of 22 years old who, after fulfilling the wishes of his parents by seeing out his undergraduate degree in Atlanta took himself on a two year trans-American adventure without money or provisions to prove to himself that he could live a meager and self fulfilling existence without the luxuries… actually – more than that – his odyssey was to live an existence without in order to cleanse himself.

He was found, dead, in Alaska two and half years after he left, apparently starved…

It would be easy to look at this book from a mortality perspective, but I never read it as that… It’s a little like hearing or watching the story of Titanic – in that you know what happens, but what is interesting and provoking is his journey and his character.

I vaguely recall Krakauer’s initial article from 1993 being published (captured here), when I was only a couple of years younger than McCandless and thinking how tragic and senseless his end was, yet that there was something about this guy that I could identify with…

In reading his story through the voices of those who met him on his travels, and those who he inspired, I remember being that bullish as a kid, not so naive as to know that there was a lot of bad crap out there, but wide-eyed enough to dream big enough about getting out there. I couldn’t help but be caught up in his Tolstoy and Jack London filled headspace.

It made me think that there are some who talk a great game and there are others who do it.

15 years ago I was somewhere between the two, especially given my disdain for all things titular, and those institutions (such as the university system) which I viewed as running as glorified day cares for the rich and stifled or as outdated dinosaurs who couldn’t recognize the growth and different thinking of the newer generations… I revolted by taking off to the darker side and basement of Edinburgh to live a life of rock and roll, next to the booming drug culture. (although I can say without reserve, that I never dabbled. Not even once)

I was, at the time, my own antithesis of what I believed was ‘expected’ of me… It took a couple of years of this, working in crappy bars, frequenting shady establishments and living fast  before I had my fill and decided to return to the real word having seen and experienced a unique side of life, and built some great stories along the way. It would have been easy for me to have fallen into the wrong crowd and to have never come back from that – I could, had I been a weaker person, have fallen victim to some of the readily available powder and disolvables I came into contact with constantly, but I didn’t. Had that happened, I’m sure I would have been reviled and been labeled as ‘weak’ and ‘naive’.

Reading the book, I felt that burn of ‘individualism’ come flooding back; now a working stiff; the very picture of ‘conformity’.

It disappeared pretty quickly however, as I realized that my conformity was OK with me, and that responsibility is not the curse I thought it would be. In fact, it’s quite liberating into itself and has shaped me into the parent I am now.

Being a parent made me look at the tragedy that was McCandless’s life also. While there were obvious circumstances which undid his relationship with his parents, I think we all, on some level, find ourselves rebelling and searching for our independence and identity apart from them… While I know I caused my parents plenty of anguish through the years, they were never cut off… I guess as I head towards my first full year of parenthood, there are things I know now that I really had no appreciation of before about the challenges and sacrifices made for your kids, and I’m one of the lucky ones with a great, secure kid, with a lifetime of attitude ahead of him!! Hearing McCandless’s parents speak of their son; their confusion, grief and daily pain was gut wrenching. I truly hope I never experience that… it makes me want to hold onto Jack even tighter…

McCandless’s death was attributed to two main things: poisoning and accelerated starvation. When these things happen in Alaska, of course, they have been often been translated as ‘naivety’ and ’stupidity’, which is a shame, because after reading this book, and as many other accounts regarding this individual as I can find, I think those two words are about as far off the radar as can be. Few of us were likely near his capability both intellectually or physically. His one big failing was the lack of a detailed map, but that one failing would have gone against his entire raison d’être for being there.

Had he made it out alive as he had planned, he would have had a hell of a story to tell, and who knows, perhaps like me ascending from the belly of Edinburgh, he was ready to come back down to earth?

I would have loved to have spoken to him candidly and heard his thoughts on life, the world and everything. We probably would have more differences than similarities overall, but there was something about him that I saw in a younger self.

Jon Krakauer does a pretty good job of doing it for him whilst remaining unbiased in his commentary, allowing the factual words of other to do the talking, and while the movie might be overly romanticized, it gives a glorious picture trail and some Hollywood poignancy. Eddie Vedder’s soundtrack is excellent also.

I thoroughly recommend both if you were ever a free sprit and wanted to understand someone who went the whole distance.

It’s had me thinking a lot lately.