All Hail The Phantom Bear

Just finished reading Into The Wild, which made me feel so many different things; really conflicted... Obvious: sadness a la the final chapter (in which his parents visit the bus he lived and died in). I didn't know until I started reading the book that it was actually an extension of a magazine article (I saw the movie first, and assumed the book was just a sort of biography) Okay but there's lots to say; the story, Chris himself, it's all very intriguing. I was drawn to so much of it, even the passages from famous writers, emphasizing the importance of alienating oneself from human contact and society (not exactly into the idea of that but couldn't help but be drawn to everything writers have to say about it). I do identify with Chris in small ways but in more ways I admire him for traits I lack. (Traits most people lack if we wanna get technical...) Of course, there are "faults." It isn't that I personally find "faults" in him, maybe because the place I find faults in people is in their interactions with others. Chris's were amicable, (and when it came to those he didn't know and those less fortunate than himself, charitable to the extreme) but he was really himself when he was alone. His courage, ambition, persistence, extremism and passion are the traits which make up the aspect I admire most. I'm not going to make a mockery of this and say I thought about Joe Strummer the whole time, that would be a lie. But I did think of him at one point, when reading what some Alaskan natives had to say about Chris. It's some bad stuff. Stuff about being stupid, self-absorbed, unprepared. (Dying a slow death by drowning in his ego and unrealistic expectations of himself. As one could aaarrggguuue The Clash did) Some claimed, most hurtfully and ironically, that it was downright disrespectful to the land to traipse in overconfidently thinking he could handle anything thrown at him. So I'm thinking about Joe, because when I think about people so intensely intriguing and admirable to me, I think about Joe. People who I could conceivably call heroes. You know. Anyway I happen to be going through a bit of a Clash revival period, or at least little bits of the Clash phenomenon have been revived to their fullest. For example, Joe. Joe as an everything. Joe as, to me, the most fascinating intriguing beautiful multi faceted human being and representation of everything I hunger for in life. I'm really "in love" with him in every way. Really. Another aspect is live performance, and I found myself in a familiar place, obsessively youtubing; this time there were some performances I hadn't seen since it had been a while. The first album sounded brand new again out of nowhere. Janie Jones. White Riot. What's My Name. Garageland. Reborn. I also decided it was time to listen to Cut the Crap. I'd gotten over all the shit about the ending of The Clash, all the shit about Joe's mistakes and Joe's "ego" a long time ago, (I don't want to get into that shit) but I still hadn't listened to Cut the Crap. So I did. It was crap. It was really absurd. But it was pretty much what I expected. Nothing worse. And I was actually strangely into maybe two of the songs. One of them I'm like so into that it scares me; Are You Red...Y (or something) and it sounds militaristic in a creepy way (militaristic in a creepy way, just like The Clash post-mick) Joe Joe Joe. I will never again question how could you let this happen. Joe you were a human being and if you weren't you wouldn't be my hero. There I said it, my hero. I didn't mean to get so into this subject; let's bring it back to Christopher McCandless's great Alaskan adventure. I guess, among other things, it was his cut-throat attitude and passion that reminded me of Joe. But the main parallel I drew was the way people criticized them. It's inevitable that people who accomplish great things and have such ideals set for themselves will be hit with criticism. Much of not most of the criticism of both men is credible. I could agonize over it forever, weighing both sides and trying to justify but I won't anymore. Of course I'll still think about it. But when my mind wandered into these territories while reading it came to a conclusion in the form of a Mary Oliver poem. The final truth is this:

Every year
the lilies
are so perfect
I can hardly believe

their lapped light crowding
the black,
mid-summer ponds.
Nobody could count all of them -

the muskrats swimming
among the pads and the grasses
can reach out
their muscular arms and touch

only so many, they are that
rife and wild.
But what in this world
is perfect?

I bend closer and see
how this one is clearly lopsided -
and that one wears an orange blight -
and this one is a glossy cheek

half nibbled away -
and that one is a slumped purse
full of its own
unstoppable decay.

Still, what I want in my life
is to be willing
to be dazzled -
to cast aside the weight of facts

and maybe even
to float a little
above this difficult world.
I want to believe I am looking

into the white fire of a great mystery.
I want to believe that the imperfections are nothing -
that the light is everything - that it is more than the sum
of each flawed blossom rising and fading. And I do.


The light is their visions and their ideals. More generally, the light is all that's positive and passionate and beautiful about the world. And it's subjective, it's what makes life worth living for each individual person even if it hasn't yet be attained (and even if it never is). So most of all it's their lifelong efforts toward their own light (after all it's their efforts that count. And I don't mean that in a stupid "A for effort!" "At least you tried!" kind of way. I really mean the effort IS the light, it's the only thing. It's what's to be learned from. It's the one thing Joe would have wanted someone to take from him. And I hope that when the criticism ended, the praise that mattered most reached his ears and penetrated his shame which is the praise of his effort to be the change.) Now, further into it, I will not go. Because I've now read a good deal of literature on the downfall of The Clash, the downfall of Chris, and the complexities of these two characters, and I think it does a better job. And so this is my conclusion on heroes in general too. I am fine with the word, the way I define it at least. I love it.
"ALL HAIL THE PHANTOM BEAR, THE BEAST WITHIN US ALL. ALEXANDER SUPERTRAMP. MAY 1992."