It's getting colder out, and I'm sure you can already feel the onset of cabin fever. You're not looking forward to staying inside. You want to get out, to get anywhere, to the mountains, to the wilderness, anywhere but your warm, safe home. You want to get in touch with nature, learn the ways of the animals and emerge a triumphant human being. You want to get away and find yourself.
Don't do it! If what I've read and seen is true, getting in touch with nature is the first step to a horrible, painful death. If you poke the bear, the bear will eat you.
Take Grizzly Man for example. Timothy Treadwell ran off to the Alaskan wilderness over the course of 13 summers to spend time with and protect his precious bears. He got along remarkably well with them and even wound up on the Letterman show. But one summer he went out to the forest with his girlfriend and got himself eaten. And to make things worse, Werner Herzog made a really good movie out of it. The poor guy should've known better.
Disgruntled males have a thing for the Alaskan wilderness. Christopher McCandless, searching for the essential things in life, ran off to the woods and died in an abandoned bus of either poisoning or starvation or both. And to make things worse, Jon Krakauer made a really good book out of it, which then became a pretty good movie. Into the Wild will convince you either to find yourself in the Great Out There or stay comfy at home, but either way it's a compelling read.
Crazy for the Storm takes a whole new spin on things. Norman Ollestad's memoir recalls how, as a child, his father pushed him into ever more extreme scenarios, from trekking through Central America to top-tier skiing competitions. The hectic life came to an end when, in a plane on their way to a ski championship ceremony, young Ollestad, his father and his father's girlfriend flew straight into the side of a mountain. The constant thrill-seeking led to disaster, but it also helped the young child dig his way out of it, and the epilogue is a touching, fascinating portrayal of an older Ollestad wondering how to raise his own son.
As far as I'm concerned, I'm just staying at home.
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