friday pandora ten – “call of the wild” edition
So…yeah. It’s been a long week (despite being shorter than usual thanks to some time off from work), and it ain’t over yet. Next week looks just as loaded. Hrm.
My commute this week has been relatively easy, thankfully – I’ve been working throught he audiobook of John Krakauer’s Into the Wild, which pieces together the story of Chris McCandless, who, after dropping more or less off the grid for a few years and tramping around the American West after graduating from university, hiked into the Alaska wilderness intending to live off the land. His journals indicate he survived quite well for several months, but eventually succumbed to what appears to be starvation (though the actual circumstances are in dispute).
McCandless was an interesting, if eccentric character. Stubborn and more than a little naive, but still, at least in my mind, kind of admirable. The guy jumped into life with both feet, and stuck to his principles (even if his principles were slightly strange). I saw more than little bit of me in him; or more accurately, I saw in him a bit of what parts of me aspire to be. I understand the need for solitude, and the recitence to develop strong connections with the world, if not to the extent McCandless felt it, and perhaps not for the same reasons, but I think I understand
That said, I think there’s a piece of many of us that would love to shuck off all of the responsibilities our lives have accumulated and just walk off into the bush and live a simple life in communion with nature. The idea itself is terribly liberating, however unrealistic. Most of us have to be content with weekend hikes along the AT or off-road cycling runs along the fringes of the megalopolis, but it’s still kind of nice to know that there are people out there who have actually tried.
Um. Tunes. A little heavy on the 80s metal this time, but that’s what I get for listening to hours of it on Pandora the other week. I’ve got the algorithms tuned to Aquanet and Spandex, it seems.
- “Bad Medicine” – Bon Jovi
- “Sweet Child o’ Mine – Guns & Roses
- “Separate Ways (Worlds Apart) – Journey
- “Don’t Know What You Got (live)” – Cinderella
- “Take On Me (extended version) – A-Ha
- “Little Lion Man” – Mumford & Sons
- “I Fell In Love With A Girl” – White Stripes
- “Women and Men” – They Might Be Giants
- “Tainted Love” – Soft Cell
- “For Whom the Bell Tolls” – Metallica
