Into the Wild

The length of this post will not express the feeling I am experiencing. Nevertheless, I am finding it increasingly more difficult to make time to write my thoughts down, even though I myself value them tremendously (a fault that I will eventually have to confront) and take pleasure in reading them once they are written down. Apart from the narcissism, I am always surprised to read the words I write because I doubt that I am capable of writing anything coherent, intelligent, or moving. Nevertheless and moving on, here are my thoughts.

I am increasingly, rapidly, and frequently thinking about nature, about the wild. I think it has something to do with the trip I am making over spring break, coupled with a recent viewing of "Into The Wild." There is just something about nature that appeals to me so strongly now, an appeal that was absent in my growing up years. I have the strong urge to wash my clothes in a river and hang them on a clothesline; to wear boots that take me to the top of a mountain that overlooks an expansive forest; to watch a campfire dance and to hear the crackling of the wood. I wonder if this longing is typical in youthful males, in every male even. It must be, because since starting "Into the Wild" (the book), I have had over a half dozen males tell me how good of a book it is, comments that aren't typically expressed in Abilene community (that is a comment more on the lack of desire to read in my generation than anything else).

I regret that this desire has come over me after I left home. My father was always trying to get me interested in the outdoors: we participated in multiple father-son nature groups, we went camping once or twice, he bought me a pair of intense boots that would keep your feet dry if you jumped into a lake, things like that. And every attempt he made was met with my violent indifference, the same as if someone asked you how your day was. I realize now that, along with everything else in my life, I had to find it for myself. I had to discover the desire within without any prodding or encouragement or optimistic hopefulness.

Now, I think I could converse with my dad about nature and not feel the stinging hesitation of apathy that pushes my shoulders forward and cocks my head sideways into a pitiful, weak stance that indicates how I don't want to comply, but I also don't want to offend.

Hopefully, this feeling won't go away, like so many other motivations in my life. I hope I can see this desire through the rest of my days, a life full of experiences of clean air, fresh earth, dangerous encounters and lasting memories.

"Nothing is more damaging to the adventurous spirit within a man than a secure future." Christopher Johnson McCandless