When the author Cheryl
Strayed’s mother was diagnosed of cancer that sneaked on a person with healthy
habits, she thought it must be her town docs who didn’t know much. While the
docs gave the mom a year, she died in 49 days.
Cheryl had imagined a family with
her as the substitute mother which didn’t work. After that her whole family
came unglued, she was untethered but for her marriage which she pulled out of
to ‘gather(ed) up inside of me’ through a hike on the Pacific crest trail.
The mode of walking she chose
needs a comment. Her journey is halfway between a pilgrimage like ‘The
Santiago’ but there is no one to stamp to validate that you went through all
the stops and a road trip like ‘Going back to Bisbee’ by Richard Shelton where
the landscape plays a major part with its detailed history. Here the author
turns herself into the place that she delves into. Its said that driving is by
muscle memory once you learn it but walking being the most natural act, frees
your mind to do the thinking. But in the wild, solo the mind also fuels its
fears. In this tug of war, what helped the author was the books she carried
with her.
On the hike she wonders about
the hardness of PCT vs the recent events in her life and thinks that ‘Perhaps the impulse to purchase the PCT
guidebook months before had been a primal grab for a cure, for the thread of my
life that had been severed’.
The way she begins her hike
with an oversized pack that she is unable to lift is hilarious.
She comes across as a person
with ‘should have read the guide’ seems ill prepared for the PCT hike. But after
one day on the trail she feels experienced. Her hiking pace doubles in a couple
of weeks. Her way of confronting the wild animals is calling out their names.
This act of strength is
something that everyone applauds while at the same time they wonder about the
parents who would let their daughter go it alone in the wild like this. This
subject being broached up frequently by the fellow hikers, she has to find the
coordinates of her family ties.
She wanted to do the hike
alone and turned down company during the hike. She wanted full responsibility
of her survival on the trail. Yet, the vastness amazing her also left her
lonely. At stop points she was always glad to have company and meet up with
other PCT
Hikers.
The author chose ‘Bridge of
the Gods’ as her destination. Bridge which is a symbol for transformation.
‘The bull, I acknowledged grimly, could be in either
direction, since I hadn’t seen where he’d run once I closed my eyes. I could
only choose between the bull that would take me back and the bull that would
take me forward.
And so I walked on.’
We are now in the mountains
and they are in us ..
John Muir, My First summer in the Sierra
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