The other night I watched Into the Wild. It’s based on the book of the same name by Jon Krakauer and tells the true life story of Christopher McCandless. In 1990 he burned his money and identity cards, gave away his savings, and wandered for two years before walking unprepared into the Alaskan wilderness where he died of starvation.

Wikipedia and Jon K. tell us that Chistopher McCandless’s death could have been prevented if he had packed a compass and adequate supplies. Or if he hadn’t deliberately forgone a map, which would have shown him the town within a day’s walk of camp. Or if he knew how to turn a moose into jerky, or forage for adequate food. It was a conditional death; the eulogies are filled with “ifs.”

His story provokes schismatic reactions: you either hate him for being a stupid R/romantic kid who got himself killed, or you worship him as an E/enlightened prophet. To the former camp, he inspires far more ire than, say, a serial drunk driver who smashes into a telephone pole, or a longtime smoker with terminal lung cancer. In those cases you could also say that those people did it to themselves, stupidly. But they rarely get editorial-length takedowns the way that Christopher McCandless has. No, there is special rancor reserved for dreamers.

Naturally, I’m more on the latter side of the schism (Go Dreamers!), but I see Chris McCandless in the context of my larger pet problem of modern maturity. My culture, the middle-class American (white) culture, has no rites of passage that put life and body on the line. It’s easy to sustain adolescence over an entire lifetime. (Study Question: How many mature, functioning adults are there in the workplace? In your workplace?)

And so back to Christopher McCandless. Twenty-two years old and a path before him of easy adolescence stretched out in long cash-lined decades. Eff that. So he improvised a transformative rite of passage, one that truly put his life and body on the line. And he messed it up.

But if he had come out of it? I think he would be one of the more premium, mature human beings you or I would ever meet, dreamer or not¹.

as a side note
The other week I nearly threw a for-real tantrum, like an out-of-control tantrum, because I needed clean underwear and I was about to miss my train and the laundry key was just in my hand I swear and now where is it? WhErrE IsIT?! And I did not go as far into tantrum as I was prepared to go that day, but I was prepared to go all the way. I’m almost 30 years old. Really, self?

Sometimes I frame “the maturity problem” as how to achieve self-actualization or secular enlightenment. But on a much more basic, and urgent level, I mean maturity as an even keel in all emotional weather. Spilled milk might cause a child to cry, but the adult just gets a paper towel, and wipes it up. Just think: all problems could be met with just as little anxiety, fear, and hesitation.

¹Oh I am fully (fully) cognizant of Insufferable Dreamers (IDs). Believe you me.