Wild at Heart

My wife and I recently watched a movie about Christopher McCandless who, in an attempt to find himself and be cleansed of his worldly distractions, found his way to wilderness Alaska where he lived for a few months and eventually died. It is fascinating to me to see this story and recognize the idealism of the young man. I remarked to Wonderful that I was considering something similar when I was single in my twenties because I felt that I has been damaged by my materialistic society too. I had even gone so far as to research how to disappear without a trace, but I abandoned my quest for an escape when I realized that I had a responsibility to give to my society. I could not simply walk away from everything and accomplish what I was created to do. I also had a deep attachment to my parents, who are wonderfully loving, and realized that I really needed them in a sense. So I branched out in other ways and found a position hundreds of miles from home where I made a name for myself, and surrounded myself with people who didn't care about my father's accomplishments. I learned the same things about the value of relationships that Christopher did without risking my parents' sanity so much.


I look back at those days of idealism and realize that I had so much to learn. I have watched many teenagers grow up, and it is true for them as it was for me- you change alot every year until you are late into your twenties. I think it has something to do with brain development. At any rate when I was younger I preached a good sermon and persuaded some people who were charmed by my simplistic idealism like Christoper did, but in the intervening years I learned it isn't so simple. Like Christopher I was arrogant and selfish, and if he survived his time in Alaska I wonder if he would look back on his youthful idealism with the same level of regret that I do. 


If I could, I would go back and tell myself that not so many people are persuaded by the truth as you expect there should be. I thought it would be so simple to find the truth and share it, but the fact is that "truth" is much more complex and elusive than it appears to a young mind. I would tell myself that people are not as easy to understand as they should be. I wish I could tell myself at twenty that people are much more important than ideals, and relationships are much more valuable than ironing out contradictions. People lie to themselves much more than they realize, and miss the point much more than they should. But they have so much to offer even so.


I still feel right about the materialism, though. We can acquire things and a name, but in the end the monument erases the person it represents, and memories become the story while the true person melts away into nothing. Ask John Adams about that, he would know.