Of Grizzly Bears and Right English Gentlemen

Oh man, I have thought about living in the Alaskan wilderness many a time. I live in a wooden room filled with wooden pictures of wolves, deer, fish, all things pastoral. One of my favorite things is the PBS show Alone In The Wilderness. For those who aren't familiar, this is a mini-series about Dick Proenekke, who, at the age of 52, went to live alone in a remote area of Alaska. He built himself a log cabin using only hand tools, many of which he made himself. He hunted. He gathered. He planted a small garden. He was totally self-sustained. He spent most of the next thirty years in that cabin. And, fortunately for the rest of us, he filmed it all. Well, at least all of the first sixteen months.

One of my favorite books (non-fiction) is How To Stay Alive In The Woods by Bradford Angier. It reads as if it were written by a right English gentleman from the 19th century taking a camping trip, although it was written in the fifties. It probably wouldn't keep anyone alive in the woods for too long, but the idea of it is what gets me. Living off of a few tools and your knowledge. I am not one for the modern conveniences. I don't own a phone. I don't own a TV. I only own a computer for school. Leaving this life behind seems fairly easy for me.

So, in short, I would love to try. I don't know if I would last, but neither did Chris McCandless. Obviously, he did not. But if that were ever a great enough deterrent, mankind would still be relegated to Africa. McCandless set out to test his mettle, to find out the limits of what he could withstand. I am all about that. Give me some warm clothes, a map, a compass, and a shotgun and I'm there. It would be tough, but all great things are. Or they should be.

Although, most of them don't involve bears.

p.s. This guy lasted about 2 hours before he was mauled by this bear.

Rachel's Prompt

The saga of Sean Knox's life is a long and winding one. Let's begin when I was 2.........Just kidding.

I am 27. I had never been in any college course, of any kind, until last Monday. It's kind of wierd, being as I love learning and knowledge so much. I guess I always told myself that I didn't need college for that; that I was getting the real education, the one that life gives you. But I came to a point where I realized that the piece of paper you get at the end of this college extravaganza is a pretty important one. So here I am, a 27 year old freshmen.

My first love is music. I play guitar, mostly. I can play banjo and keys passably well. I also sing. I'm in a folk-rock band here, in Pullman. We're called Buffalo Death Beam. I also love to write. Songs, yes. But also short stories. I'd love to be a writer someday. More than just for myself, I mean. I love to read. I'm a little worried that beginning college is going to kill my reading for pleasure time, but when I do get to do it I like to read the non-traditionalists, the non-comformists, people who mess around with language and ideas. The Beats. Jack Kerouac is amazing. Kurt Vonnegut. Charles Bukowski. The poetry of E. E. Cummings. My favorite book, though, is a newer one. Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer.

So that's me. I read. I play music. I'm a really old freshmen.

Of Past Lives & Tree Frogs

My grandmother is a frog. Not a toad, brown and warty. Not a bullfrog; a sedate pile of goo. But a lithesome, verdant frog. Green as a St. Patty's Day parade. Graceful as a ballerina. My mother believes she is a moth. But I know better. I've know since I was a child; back when grandma was still alive. I was too young to understand the religious concept of reincarnation, but I always knew it to be true. Needed it to be true. Needed to know that life on this planet was not relegated to the span of 60, 80, 90 years. I've always been terrified of death.