Okay, okay, so it’s just a catchy
title that I hope will interest you enough to read on a bit. However, this is about what some would
consider as wild women!
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The other book that I
just finished is Wild: From Lost to Found On the Pacific Crest Trail, by
Cheryl Strayed (Knopf). This book is
also about finding one’s self, particularly as a woman. This local Portland author set out alone to
hike the Pacific Crest Trail which she describes as, “A world that measures two
feet wide by 2663 miles long,” stretching from the Mexican border on the south
to Canada on the north.
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With the turning of the pages each
describing some particular challenge along the path, I would think of people I
know who I felt could also identify with this journey, or who I think would at
least enjoy the accomplishments recorded day by day. Maybe these thoughts are representative of the old saying that if
you find yourself wishing some other person in your life could know this, it is
really you that needs the experience.
I can accept that, but still, there are people I know and love that I
wish could share this journey, perhaps with the realization that we are on that
journey together.
So often, particularly in close
relationships, things begin to be taken for granted. In that period something is lost in those relationships because
expectations begin to diverge almost unnoticed until
you find yourself on a different path all together. The author volitionally chose the most difficult path one could
imagine. On that path she found
herself. She discovered the roots and
development of her relationships, particularly with her mother and siblings,
but also with others in her life.
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It was a deeply emotional experience
for the author, and for me as her reader.
She mentioned at one point in the journey how she would not let herself
cry. It was also true that there was
often not enough moisture in her body to provide tears. When she finally reached the Bridge of the
Gods that crossed the Columbia River at Cascade Locks and after she allowed
herself the pleasure of an ice cream cone that left her with only 20 cents to
her name, she cried. They were tears of
exhilaration, not those of exhaustion.
She had accomplished what she had set out to do. She had begun not knowing for sure why, but
ending it knowing who she was and totally empowered as one of those special wild
women!
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