The Other: Blog 5 3-15-09

We pick up the story with sacrifice, and the desired happy ending of so many stories. Alas, John William is not doing well. He is cranky, and running out of luck. An elk was killed near his cave, and when he came upon it, he decided to cook it, however, he only managed to save a fore and hindquarter. This meat was planned to last the entire winter, even though it was found before June. It didn’t last past July. The interesting part is what he does with the rest of the elk. “He’d rolled up its antlers, teeth, bladder, hooves, and sinew in its hide” (173). That may seem to be the obvious thing to do, but what if you had to do this with something else? Someone or something you weren’t planning on eating or using to make garments? John William’s demeanor became very defensive whenever Neil tried to communicate with him. Neil asked him to play chess, smoke dope, leave the cave, and meet a woman, but every time John William shot him down, saying that dope gave him nightmares, or leaving is crazier than staying and going crazy (175). John William began to lose everything he had wanted, from dope, the first commonality between Neil and himself, to chess, their two great minds working against each other to gain the upper hand, to his freedom. Living in the woods was great for him, he didn’t want to be in the “hamburger world”, but was he really outside this world? Neil constantly brought him items from general stores, and he didn’t turn them away, instead he welcomed them, but was too afraid, (self-conscious?) to go out and buy it for himself. John William was a narrow minded individual who wouldn’t rest until he had the life that he wanted, even if he didn’t know what life he wanted…
“John William died” (177). I didn’t like this book, but this section was so well written that I couldn’t put the book down. These three simple words; completely changed the dynamics of the novel. The comparison to the elk comes here when Neil “got up, reluctantly, and did what I thought I should do, which was to shove John William’s remains onto the mat and roll them up…he fit” (178). This was the saddest part, whether Mr. Guterson meant to compare the portaging of an elk’s remains to that of a human’s or not, I couldn’t avoid it. Not to be cynical, but wasn’t this what John William had wanted? He wanted to be alone in the wild, having to fend for himself. He always tried to send Neil away whenever he came by. I don’t know but, it seems almost fitting, that may be a horrible thing to say, but that is what came to mind when I read this part. Back in the present, Neil has moved on past his friend’s death, he took up a poem written by Han Shan, a Chinese poet that John William had loved reading.
A hermit’s hear it heavy
He mourns the passing years
He looks for roots and mushrooms
He seeks eternal life in vain (186).
While, John William was not looking for eternal life, he was surely looking for a better life; one that he hoped would lead to true happiness.
This happiness may never have been achieved but Neil certainly came close when he found out as the title of chapter 7 says, he was the “nineteenth-richest person in Washington State”. In the spring of this year a report came out in the Seattle Times saying that there were human remains in Olympic National Park and that there was evidence of long-term habitation and potential foul play (199). When Neil was eventually identified as a friend of the deceased, an attorney, Mark Sides, called him up and had Neil come down to his office where he announced the good news, “as we speak, you and I, you’re the nineteenth-richest person in Washington State. Give or take you net worth is four hundred forty million dollars” (205). Turns out that John William had left all he owned to Neil, 440 million dollars worth. I can’t quite tell you if this section focuses on positives or negatives, per se. Would you rather lose your best friend, who lived in the middle of the woods as a hermit and gain 440 million dollars? Or, keep your friend who didn’t seem to want you around, except when you brought him stuff he could use, and thus insult you for being too caught up in the hamburger world. That’s a choice that really cannot be made; it has to be made for you, just like it was for Neil.