It was a beautiful coincidence to meet this book Wild which Yuan sent me as a gift when she left China. All things happen in our life like this, you never know when it will come and sometimes it just shows up and brings surprises. When i started to read Wild i felt it was meant to meet me, for you will never know there is another person who lives in another part globe having almost the similar experience like yourself. And you must think it is a dream and it won’t never come true. However, it is true, 100% truly happened among us.
Wild ,written by Cheryl Strayed, who said from lost to found on the Pacific Crest Trail. When i first saw the map of PCT, i just couldn’t believe she can make it. We can see the introduction i found from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
It was designated a National Scenic Trail in 1968, although it was not officially completed until 1993. The PCT was conceived by Clinton Churchill Clarke in 1932.It received official status under the National Trails System Act of 1968.
It is the westernmost and second longest component of the Triple Crown of Hiking and is part of the 6,875-mile Great Western Loop.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Crest_Trail)
According to her book, the PCT ,it said, was a continuous wilderness trail that went from the Mexican border in California to just beyond the Canadian border along the crest of nine mountains ranges---the Laguna, San Jacinto, San Bernardino, San Gabriel, Liebre, Tehachapi, Sierra Nevada, Klamath, and Cascades. That distance was a thousand miles as the crow flies, but the trail was more than double that. Traversing the entire length of the stats of California, Oregon, and Washington, the PCT passes through national parks and wilderness areas as well as federal, tribal, and privately held lands; through deserts and mountains and rain forests; across rivers and highways. She turned the book over and gazed at its front cover a boulder-strewn lake surrounded by rocky crags against a blue sky then placed it back on the shelf, paid for her shovel and left. But later she returned and bought the book. It became an idea, vague and outlandish, full of promise and mystery.
Maybe when we see from this page we can exactly know what kind of adventure Cheryl chose , so distant, so dangerous, so cold, so hot, different regions… however she made her mind and she decided to do it and finally she did it. And that is why now i am here to write something she inspired me in my life.
The reason why she went to this wilderness trek, mainly because of the death of her mom. She said she was twenty-six and an orphan too, an actual stray. Her father left her life when she was six, her mother died when she was twenty-two. In the wake of her mom’s death, her stepfather morphed from the person she considered her dad into a man she only occasionally recognized. Her two siblings scattered in their grief, in spite of her efforts to hold them together, until she gave up and scattered as well.
When she wrote the so details about when she saw her mom gone, she threw all her head to mom’s belly just to feel her warmth left. She couldn’t believe she just left awhile to call her brother to come to visit her, how this goodbye becoming eternal bye. She broke her mind ,she got mad, she got insane, she got confused about her life since her mom left. That broken heart couldn’t be healed anymore, the empty hole inside never ever fulfilled. I read this part and i cried , i just lost my granny too. The first second i knew she may leave me i couldn’t breathe and stand by myself… i ran to her side and i cried Granny… she just couldn’t reply me..just couldn’t … she breathed so hard, she couldn’t eat anything. I put water to wet her lips, her body was burning so fiercely. I hold her hands, i threw my head to her chest and i murmured Granny plz plz plz plz don’t leave me, i know you must have been through so painful now, but plz plz plz don’t leave me alone, how i am supposed to live the rest of my life without you, my graduation, my wedding, my family, my child, my every important moment… sadly, after two days she was gone forever.
Cheryl got out of her mind after mom’s death, she gave up the university register, she lived with her husband, however, after some time she moved out, got divorced and slept with another addict, the same she started to spoil herself with sex and drugs. She just lost herself in sorrow and confusion, fear and hopelessness. It was her husband who really did love her came to find her and helped her to realize this was not the life she wanted and she suddenly saw the magazines about PCT, thus she decided to go. She had first heard of PCT only seven months before, when she was living in Minneapolis, sad and desperate and on the brink of divorcing a man she still loved. She’d been standing in line at an outdoor store waiting to purchase a foldable shovel when she picked up a book called The Pacific Crest Trail, Volume I: California from a nearby shelf and read the back cover.
See, for a person, it is easy to go downhill, if you want to be good oppositely, you will never imagine how much effort and hardship you need to go through to make everything the right way.
SHE STARTED.
In this book, there are all five parts except the Author’s Note/Map/Prologue/Acknowledgments/Books Burned on the PCT.
After she made the decision ,she got prepared everything. She sold most of her assets and said goodbye to her friends, ex-husband, boyfriend..
During this PCT trip, she met different people, who were also adventurers, who were the hotel owners, who were the post officers, who were visitors…who were good also evil. But i think for her the most challenging things were facing the loneliness and fear in the woods alone. She had a habit, she kept reading before she went to sleep, and every time when done she just burned the pages. The novels, the poems, the … it also told me whenever and wherever, books are the only friends who can really light you in your life road. I should believe that earlier.
She trekked across deserts and snow, past trees and bushes and grasses and flowers of all shapes and sizes and colors, walked up and down mountains and over fields and glades and stretches of land she couldn’t possibly define, except to say that she had been there ,passed over it, made it through.
This trip , she carried a so so so huge bag, which became her best friend in this trail which contained tent, sleeping bag, water purifier, ultra light stove, and the little orange whistle that she carried in lieu of a gun. She made a good preparation that she delivered funds to different stops near the trail. Thus she can charge herself when she finished one part, also it become a big motivation for to keep walking when she almost gave because of the dangerous animals, the hard way, no water, no more thick clothes… and another friend i need to mention was her boots which were broken before and too narrow damaged her toes while walking, however finally she got a new one from the company.
She met different people ,some she was obsessed with, some she memorized… and the only one guy who had sex. It was funny when one of the person who tried to help her lose her heavy package, he found the condoms. Even she tried to keep one ,unfortunately she lost at last. But when she went to a town bar, she met the guy who liked her too. They had a good time and her sex dream came true here. Happy for her.
I cannot imagine if it were who underwent those adventures, if i could eventually go through all… you may be hurt in the deserted forest by a giant bear, you may be without water when you are in a fiery rocky mountain, you may be attacked when you try to help someone who also needs help, anyway they make use of your goodness, you will get sexual harassment or abuse when you meet someone who is horny, you will lose your mind when you lose your way to next stop and you don’t have anyone to ask for help, you may be swallowed by the lighting, wind, thunder, rain… happily, she made all.
SHE WENT THROUGH ALL.
She taught me by her own experience ,in our own life, nothing is impossible if you make the decision. She helped me learn that nothing you will lose if you lose everything, then you can become braver and braver to do anything, even it is a crazy thing that nobody will support you. She healed me about death. We couldn’t be healed when we lose someone, however, this sorrow will keep us moving, towards a better life and a better ourself.
I used to think i was an orphan too. My parents got divorced when i was a child, since then i lived with grandparents. I tried so hard to be a good girl, i tried to help them with everything, i did all good jobs in my school study. I got admission to a first-class university, i got the scholarships, i went out to see this world by myself… i met good people who treated me so kind, i met bad guys who just made use of my kindness. However i never gave up on the good hope. Maybe just like Cheryl, life is when splitting so bad we still continue moving, then light enters to our life.
We couldn’t ever change our birth environment, we couldn’t ever give up what is destined in our life, we couldn’t turn down the failure we made before… but we do have a choice.
There was always only one:
To keep walking
By Yu
20180803 17:19
