"Two years he walks the earth.
No phone, no pool, no pets, no cigarettes.
Ultimate Freedom.
An extremist. An aesthetic voyager whose home is the road.
Escaped from Atlanta.
Thou shalt not return, 'cause "the West is the best."
And now after two rambling years comes the final and greatest adventure.
The climactic battle to kill the false being within and victoriously conclude the spiritual pilgrimage.
Ten days and nights of freight trains and hitchhiking bring him to the Great White North.
No longer to be poisoned by civilization, he flees, and walks alone upon the land to become...
Lost In The Wild. "
-Christopher McCandless, a.k.a. 'Alexander Supertramp', May 1992
An Abridged Backstory:
After graduating from university in 1990, Chris decided to make an abrupt, absolute, clean break from society for some period of time, and live in solitude in the wild. He dreamed of Alaska. He looked upon the "empty materialism" of America with the most intense contempt, and could no longer be a part of it. He needed out so badly that he didn't take any time to learn how to survive in the middle of nowhere, all alone with hardly any supplies. He didn't want to take any kind of provisions that would make it too easy. Anything that would remove the purity of the adventure. The idea was that any indication of the type of civilized society that he was so desperate to leave behind would taint everything he wanted to stand for. He wanted to just be out there, away from all the people he believed were in denile of how shallow and meaningless the world was becoming. He just wanted to "live off the land, far away from civilization, and keep a journal describing his physical and spiritual progress as he faced the forces of nature".
He died of starvation in Alaska, in August 1992.
Just as his body was starved of food, his soul had been starved for the idealistic world that could never be real. If he hadn't become lost and trapt in the wilderness, I wonder what would have happened to him on his return to society. Theoretically, even having successfully lived modestly and humbly in the wild, and then returned... I don't know if he would have been able to last long. His soul was dying in society, his body dying in the wild. And a person needs both soul and body to truly live.
Here's the question I've been asking myself, struggling with, on what McCandless did: Was it inspirational or irrational? Was it brave or was it cowardly? Heroic or reckless? Arrogant and irresponsible? Or was it simply tragic?
The closest I've gotten to an answer: ...... All of the above?
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
The Weakerthans: "Left and Leaving"...
My city's still breathing but barely it's true,
through buildings gone missing like teeth.
The sidewalks are watching me think about you,
sparkled with broken glass.
I'm back with scars to show.
Back with the streets I know
will never take me anywhere but here.
The stain in the carpet, this drink in my hand,
the strangers whose faces I know.
We meet here for our dress-rehearsal to say
"I wanted it this way."
Wait for the year to drown.
Spring forward, fall back down.
I'm trying not to wonder where you are.
All this time lingers, undefined.
Someone choose who's left and who's leaving...
Memory will rust and erode into lists
of all that you gave me:
a blanket, some matches, this pain in my chest,
the best parts of lonely,
duct-tape and soldered wires, new words for old desires,
and every birthday card I threw away.
I wait in 4/4 time.
Count yellow highway lines
that you're relying on to lead you home.
That you're relying on to lead you home...
That you're relying on to lead you home.
through buildings gone missing like teeth.
The sidewalks are watching me think about you,
sparkled with broken glass.
I'm back with scars to show.
Back with the streets I know
will never take me anywhere but here.
The stain in the carpet, this drink in my hand,
the strangers whose faces I know.
We meet here for our dress-rehearsal to say
"I wanted it this way."
Wait for the year to drown.
Spring forward, fall back down.
I'm trying not to wonder where you are.
All this time lingers, undefined.
Someone choose who's left and who's leaving...
Memory will rust and erode into lists
of all that you gave me:
a blanket, some matches, this pain in my chest,
the best parts of lonely,
duct-tape and soldered wires, new words for old desires,
and every birthday card I threw away.
I wait in 4/4 time.
Count yellow highway lines
that you're relying on to lead you home.
That you're relying on to lead you home...
That you're relying on to lead you home.
Friday, March 20, 2009
...
jeal⋅ous⋅y
[jel-uh-see]
–noun, plural -ous⋅ies for 4.
1. jealous resentment against a rival, a person enjoying success or advantage, etc., or against another's success or advantage itself.
2. mental uneasiness from suspicion or fear of rivalry, unfaithfulness, etc., as in love or aims.
3. vigilance in maintaining or guarding something.
4. a jealous feeling, disposition, state, or mood.
com⋅pas⋅sion
[kuhm-pash-uhn]
–noun
1. a feeling of deep sympathy and sorrow for another who is stricken by misfortune, accompanied by some desire to alleviate the suffering.
con⋅flict
[v. kuhn-flikt; n. kon-flikt]
–verb (used without object)
1. to come into collision or disagreement; be contradictory, at variance, or in opposition; clash:
2. to fight or contend; do battle.
–noun
3. a fight, battle, or struggle, esp. a prolonged struggle; strife.
4. controversy; quarrel: conflicts between parties.
5. discord of action, feeling, or effect; antagonism or opposition, as of interests or principles: a conflict of ideas.
6. a striking together; collision.
7. incompatibility or interference, as of one idea, desire, event, or activity with another.
8. a mental struggle arising from opposing demands or impulses.
[jel-uh-see]
–noun, plural -ous⋅ies for 4.
1. jealous resentment against a rival, a person enjoying success or advantage, etc., or against another's success or advantage itself.
2. mental uneasiness from suspicion or fear of rivalry, unfaithfulness, etc., as in love or aims.
3. vigilance in maintaining or guarding something.
4. a jealous feeling, disposition, state, or mood.
com⋅pas⋅sion
[kuhm-pash-uhn]
–noun
1. a feeling of deep sympathy and sorrow for another who is stricken by misfortune, accompanied by some desire to alleviate the suffering.
con⋅flict
[v. kuhn-flikt; n. kon-flikt]
–verb (used without object)
1. to come into collision or disagreement; be contradictory, at variance, or in opposition; clash:
2. to fight or contend; do battle.
–noun
3. a fight, battle, or struggle, esp. a prolonged struggle; strife.
4. controversy; quarrel: conflicts between parties.
5. discord of action, feeling, or effect; antagonism or opposition, as of interests or principles: a conflict of ideas.
6. a striking together; collision.
7. incompatibility or interference, as of one idea, desire, event, or activity with another.
8. a mental struggle arising from opposing demands or impulses.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
My kind of one track mind... (from ffffound.com)
These are just some images that I strongly feel capture the true nature of my soul...
Friday, March 6, 2009
I can't pretend to be wise...
...but if I were pretending to be wise, this is the one piece of advice I might offer:
Make the time to look at your life and figure out who those people are with whom you share some type of a mutual and true love. [This is not neccessarily a romantic love.] The people who love all of your flaws and short comings just because they're yours. The people you could spend forever with and never once feel like you have to try to say what they want to hear, as opposed to what you really believe. They let you know that you can be the purest, most honest and stripped down version of yourself, totally weak and vulnerable, and still be without any doubt in your mind that they love you in that moment. You have an unconditional connection, free of judgement, full of compassion and understanding.
If you really think about it, can you be positive that you have people in your life who fit this discription? These people will quite likely, you may realize, be the most selfless people that you've ever met. These are people who inspire you to figure out who you are, to become that person, and to better yourself with time. They don't inspire with any type of pressure; you just learn from them.
Sometimes guilt is a factor, just because I wish I could be as good to them as they are to me. Because I am fortunate enough to have perhaps a few people in my life who fit that above description. And there are a several more who come very close. A mistake I make, constantly, is not letting these people know how important they really are to me. And actually, "my mistake" is in almost every case, exactly what differentiates the several from the few. I can tell the few absolutely everything. I can tell the several everything except how much they mean to me, because in my mind, it would just seem one thing too... for lack of a more appropriate term, "cheesy". The cheesy thing is the one thing I would be afraid to say.
So why can't I say it really? Might it be because the inverse of one of my first statements is also true? Should you never once have to feel like you need to keep yourself from saying something that you think they don't want to hear? Or something that you think they would misinterpret? Is that what separates the few from the several?
It's time to stop writing when I feel as if I'm starting to make less and less sense...
That's all for now, until my brain stops reeling.
Make the time to look at your life and figure out who those people are with whom you share some type of a mutual and true love. [This is not neccessarily a romantic love.] The people who love all of your flaws and short comings just because they're yours. The people you could spend forever with and never once feel like you have to try to say what they want to hear, as opposed to what you really believe. They let you know that you can be the purest, most honest and stripped down version of yourself, totally weak and vulnerable, and still be without any doubt in your mind that they love you in that moment. You have an unconditional connection, free of judgement, full of compassion and understanding.
If you really think about it, can you be positive that you have people in your life who fit this discription? These people will quite likely, you may realize, be the most selfless people that you've ever met. These are people who inspire you to figure out who you are, to become that person, and to better yourself with time. They don't inspire with any type of pressure; you just learn from them.
Sometimes guilt is a factor, just because I wish I could be as good to them as they are to me. Because I am fortunate enough to have perhaps a few people in my life who fit that above description. And there are a several more who come very close. A mistake I make, constantly, is not letting these people know how important they really are to me. And actually, "my mistake" is in almost every case, exactly what differentiates the several from the few. I can tell the few absolutely everything. I can tell the several everything except how much they mean to me, because in my mind, it would just seem one thing too... for lack of a more appropriate term, "cheesy". The cheesy thing is the one thing I would be afraid to say.
So why can't I say it really? Might it be because the inverse of one of my first statements is also true? Should you never once have to feel like you need to keep yourself from saying something that you think they don't want to hear? Or something that you think they would misinterpret? Is that what separates the few from the several?
It's time to stop writing when I feel as if I'm starting to make less and less sense...
That's all for now, until my brain stops reeling.
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Part of "Pamphleteer"...
I'm no good with words, but John K. Samson is a poet. And a musician. From my hometown. Observe:
"I'm weary with right-angles, abbreviated daylight, and waiting for a winter to be done. Why do I still see you in every mirrored window, in all that I could never overcome? How I don't know what I should do with my hands when I talk to you. How you don't know where you should look, so you look at my hands..."
What else...
con⋅fu⋅sion [kuhn-fyoo-zhuhn]
–noun
1. disorder; upheaval; tumult; chaos: The army retreated in confusion.
2. lack of clearness or distinctness: a confusion in his mind between right and wrong.
3. perplexity; bewilderment: The more difficult questions left us in complete confusion.
4. embarrassment or abashment: She blushed in confusion.
Lastly...
–noun
1. disorder; upheaval; tumult; chaos: The army retreated in confusion.
2. lack of clearness or distinctness: a confusion in his mind between right and wrong.
3. perplexity; bewilderment: The more difficult questions left us in complete confusion.
4. embarrassment or abashment: She blushed in confusion.
Lastly...
(ffffound.com)Sunday, March 1, 2009
Post the First...
I'm just going to post random pictures every once in a while until I work my way up to writing. (picture from ffffound.com)
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