"there is pleasure in the pathless woods;
there is a rapture on the lonely shore;
there is society where none intrudes;
by the deep sea, and music in its roar;
i love the man not less, but nature more."
- lord byron
christopher johnson mccandless led a convenient life - a father who works at nasa and a mother, in the same industry, grew up in the upscale suburbs of virginia. but despite the material wealth, he is tormented by fear of a broken family especially when his parents spite each other because of money, not the lack of it but acquiring more. this emotional sadness intensified his idealism and became more athletic. as captain of cross-country team in high school, he treats running as a spiritual exercise as if he were "running against the forces of darkness...of all evil in the world" and shared this thought with his team. his idealism is further nurtured by the characters of tolstoy, jack london and especially thoreau - his inspiration for his solitary introspection-cum-adventure, an emancipation from material society. he graduated from emory university in 1990 with majors in history and anthropology. he got an honors invite from phi beta kappa society but he declined the association on the premise does not need titles, honors to be happy. two months after graduation, he would turn his life around.
and so when he finally decided to embark on his adventure, he did it with 'characteristic immoderation'. he burned his social security id, discarded his credit cards and other identifications; donated his life savings of $24,000 to oxfam - an organization founded to provide lasting solutions to poverty and injustice. armed with his backpack of clothes and shoes, at first he did not know where to go. along the way he would find his resolve - to go and live in the alaskan wilderness. determined to stick to his ideals, he burned his remaining money and only relies on what nature can offer him. "i don't need money, it makes people cautious," he says. casting away his old identity, he christened himself with a new one - alexander supertramp. from now on, i will call him alex.
alex's travails include arizona, california and south dakota, where he worked at a granary. the farmers here taught him how to hunt and preserve the meat, which later turned out to be a bad advise. in northern california, he met gypsy couple, jan and rainey, who moves around in their truck. his interaction with the couple immersed himself with the modern nomads and the hippies. he was also able to paddle a canoe from colorado river to the gulf of mexico without a license. but more than the places, the people he met were inspired by his youth, his ideals, his zest on proclaiming them. some listened to his wisdom, some did put more wisdom on it. ron franz, an old man he met in southern california, became his pseudo-foster father for a while. they grew accustomed to each other and found they are on the same spectrum of solitude but on different perspectives - one hides his grief, the loss of his family, for the longest time in his leather shop, the other wants to go out and shun organized society.
unanimously, they persuade alex from proceeding to his alaskan adventure without proper planning and tools. but society has probably taken its toll on this young man and he's already firm on his resolve. ron contributed some of his supplies, jan gave him a knitted hat, and more than that, the wealth of experience he had with these people. so off he went to alaska.
along his trail, he found a derelict and abandoned bus, he called it magic bus 140. it became his address in the alaskan nowhere. a total of 112 days out there feeding on berries and other fruits, hunting game. once he killed a moose, as advised he smoked the meat and found out to be spoilt later. he regrets killing the moose, never killed one again. in his camp, he's also nourished by the books he brought along, kept a journal of his experience. inevitably, nature can just be still and stand watching you suffer. he ate a wild potato root which can paralyze its victim. alex weakened and no longer find the right nourishment. his loose clothes were a testament to his affliction. as each belt hole adjusted inwards, his feet gravely sunk deeper into the ground. when his vision of the world slowly waned, he saw himself in the arms of his parents, happy to have him again - what if. he didn't close his eyes, tears fell in slow motion, then he finally experienced a whole new light.
at his last breath, he revised his mantra: happiness only real when shared.
found in his august 12, 1992 journal entry entitled 'beautiful blueberries' was a torn page with an excerpt from robinson jeffers' poem 'wise men in their bad hours':
death's a fierce meadowlark: but to die having made
something more equal to centuries
than muscle and bone, is mostly to shed weakness.
the mountains are dead stone, the people
admire or hate their stature, their insolent quietness,
the mountains are not softened or troubled
and a few dead men's thoughts have the same temper.
at the back of the page, he wrote and signed it with his right name:
"I HAVE HAD A HAPPY LIFE AND THANK THE LORD. GOODBYE AND MAY GOD BLESS ALL!"
- Christopher Johnson Mccandless
he needed to experience this odyssey to define his freedom, what makes him happy. too bad, his realizations became too late. and the best experience of his life happened on the brink of death. his experience need not be experienced by anyone.
i am quite drawn to his story which is explained by the length of the artik and the good 90 minutes spent writing it. i even traced his trail via google earth. and boy, was that amazing, he almost walked all of america! i have an eccentricity of my own - that experience of travelling incognito, experiencing new human relations excites me, but not as extreme as chris'. i really loved the film adaptation.
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