The Road : A Blast from the Past
By: Robin Hopper
Shredded by Loss : Atoned by Solitude
Cheryl Strayed’s “Wild,” is a profound memoir of a dark period during her young adult life. She is an emotional wreck from the death of her beloved mother from the cruel disease known as cancer. This loss has a tremendous impact on her life and sends her spiraling into a frenzied life as she divorces a man she dearly loves, having sex with multiple partners, and a brief stint of heavy drug abuse. All in the name of reality hitting her in the face. Her mom is dead, a cold, hard, gut-wrenching truth. Strayed embarks on a three month solo back-packing hike up the Pacific Crest Trail. It is an adventure hatched from the gaping hole in her heart and her brutally honest quest to find her identity.
The death of a parent, are only five little words. Yet it is these five simple little words that all children must face at one time or another. It does not matter if the loss of a parent is sudden, or you see your beloved parent go through a sickness that permanently extracts them from your life. The bottom line is that there must be a time to grieve that loss and every person grieves differently. Strayed tries to come to grips with the death of her mom for four years, but fails miserably. Strayed decides to hike the PCT. For her, “the wanting was a wilderness and I had to find my own way out of the woods. It took me four years, seven months, and three days to do it. I didn’t know where I was going until I got there” (Cheryl Strayed 27). Finding her way out of the woods was literal and metaphorical. Literally back-packing on a trail is no easy feat and she needed to be able to read her maps to keep from getting lost. Finding her way out of the woods also refers to finding herself, her purpose in life, her destiny, and ultimately the woman she is born to be.
Strayed is an overcomer and this can be seen emerging as the narrative gets towards the end of the book. For years she wears a POW bracelet for a soldier by the name of William J. Crockett. She is “less than a mile from the California border when a branch that hung along the edge of the trail caught on her Crockett bracelet and sent if flying off into the dense brush” (Strayed 238). Naturally she does not find the bracelet and is clueless what direction it flew. “It had only made the faintest ping as it flew away from me” (Strayed 238). It is in these passages that Strayed comes to realize that just as her mother lost her life to young, so did Crockett. Two lives lost way too soon. “There was nothing to do but go on” (Strayed 238). Go on is exactly what Strayed indeed does!
The solitude of the three month journey challenges Strayed emotionally and physically. However, she emerges from the wilderness with the insight that she is an overcomer. She conquers the demons that cause the gaping hole in her heart. She is set free to love again and become the woman she is destined to be.
Works Cited
Strayed, Chery. Wild. New York: Vintage Books, 2012. Print.
On The Road
Jack Kerouac’s On The Road is a novel in which the characters embark on multiple journeys driving on the road from the east coast to the west coast of America. Sal Paradise and his hip friends travel as frugally as they can as they search for the meaning of life. Historically at this time, society perceives the Beat movement lifestyle of Paradise and his fellow travelers as carefree, frivolous, and difficult to comprehend. In order to understand the novel, it is imperative to understand the Beat lifestyle, and the road they choose for their lives.
The Beat movement was a cultural season that flourished predominately in the 1950’s. World War II had ended and the country was moving forward at an accelerated rate. Not only were there large cities, but smaller suburbs were emerging. Most importantly, the Beat culture rebelled against conforming to this new rising consumer society in many ways. Maintaining steady employment was too restrictive for Paradise and his friends. Having a wife, children, and a home with a white picket fence was avoided. Instead of owning a car, hitchhiking was the favorite mode of transportation.
Sal and his friend Dean were the epitome of what the Beat movement symbolized. In Central City, Paradise, Tim, and Ray Rawlins hosted a party at a miner’s shack for their new friends. As the night progressed, Paradise admitted he was slowly joining a new Beat generation (Kerouac 48). On a regular basis, Paradise, Dean, and their buddies engaged in chemically induced binges of trying to enlighten their minds. Benzedrine and alcohol were constantly being abused in order to reach deeper levels of wisdom and utter clarity. The ultimate goal was to “communicate with absolute honesty and absolute completeness” about anything and everything (37).
Kerouac’s title On The Road provokes many thoughts. Roads are varied and unique, just as is each human life. No two roads are exactly the same, nor are two human lives identical. Roads are known by various names, such as highways, lanes, streets, avenues, and interstates. Roads can be narrow, wide, littered with pot-holes, smooth, and winding curves. Whatever type of road is travelled, the road always has a beginning and an end. Humanity travels a similar voyage in the road known as life. There are times of immense joy, and the inevitable curve that slams us with difficulties or profound grief. Life is a continuous cycle of good times and bad times, however, it is a road and journey that Paradise and all mankind must negotiate and accomplish.
According to Paradise, “life is holy and every moment is precious” (52). No matter what road we travel, or destination we seek, nothing is more important than being loved. Life is indeed fragile and should be handled with care. Perhaps what is learned in the journey is more important than the final destination.
Works Cited
Kerouac, Jack. On the Road. 1957. New York: Penguin Group, 1999. Print
I chose On the Road, by Jack Kerouac and Wild, by Cheryl Strayed.
On the Road not only because I received the highest grade possible on the analysis, but also because it was by far the most challenging of the books that I read over the course of the semester. The characters all portrayed lifestyle choices that were totally foreign to me.
Wild by Cheryl strayed was a mesmerizing journey that a young woman took to find herself. A similar journey that I presently walk as well.