In his memoir on the twenty-five years he spent living in the Northern Wilderness, John Haines writes: "I faced in myself a passionate and tenacious longing- to put away thought forever, and all the trouble it brings, all but the nearest desire, direct and searching. To take the trail and not look back. Whether on foot, on snowshoes or by sled, into the summer hills and their late freezing shadows- a high blaze, a runner track in the snow would show where I had gone. Let the rest of mankind find me if it could".

This is also the quote that opens up chapter thirteen of Jon Krauker's Into The Wild, a novel documenting the life of the late Chris McCandless, who at 24 years old ventured out alone into the Alaskan wilderness, where he would die of starvation only four months later. McCandless was from a well-to-do family in D.C., had graduated with honors from Emory University, and was an elite runner who could have pursued a traditionally "normal" career in an intellectual or athletic field.

Instead, he abandoned his identity and chose to wander across America post-graduation, dropping contact with his family and changing his name to Alexander Supertramp. From there, he burned the little money he had and worked odd jobs all across the Western United States, telling everyone he met about his lifelong goal to survive in the Alaskan wilderness. Chris wished to challenge himself, to discover a purpose for life, to create his own reality rather than live out the one his parents wished for him upon birth. Despite his obvious privilege and intellect, McCandless desired to invent his own destiny, to reject the very nature of civilized life. In a letter to his friend Ron, whom he met while traversing America, he writes:

"So many people live within unhappy circumstances and yet will not take the iniative to change their situation because they are conditioned to a life of security, conformity, and conservatism, all of which may appear to give one peace of mind, but in reality nothing is more damaging to the adventurous spirit within a man than a secure future. The very basic core of a man's living spirit is his passion for adventure. The joy of life comes from our encounters with new experiences, and hence there is no greater joy than to have an endlessly changing horizon, for each day to have a new and different sun. If you want to get more out of life, Ron, you must lose your inclination for monotonous security and adopt a helter-skelter style of life that will at first appear to you to be crazy... You are wrong if you think Joy emanates only or principally from human relationships. God has placed it all around us. It is in everything and anything we might experience. We just have to have the courage to turn against our habitual lifestyle and engage in unconventional thinking".

McCandless, when he finally made it into the Alaskan wilderness, was young, unprepared, and naive about what the next few months had in store. He stumbled upon an abandoned bus, in which he quickly made his home, where he would read and write in his journal, chronicling his experience. When his body was found by moose hunters four months later, he was starving and emaciated. And yet, in his final journal entry, McCandless writes: "I HAVE HAD A HAPPY LIFE AND THANK THE LORD. GOODBYE AND MAY GOD BLESS ALL". And in the final photograph taken of him, Chris is standing by the bus in which he lived, one hand raised in a final goodbye, body skeletal and frail, a wide smile on his face, his eyes calm and serene. No matter how he lived out his final days, Chris McCandless died a happy man.

When author Jon Krauker chronicled the story of McCandless, it was quickly met with mockery and scorn. Chris was seen as privileged and inexperienced, and many felt that his lack of knowledge and preparation were simply precursors for his end. But when I first read the novel for my junior year English class, the only response I could come up with to the backlash was a single question: how many of those mocking McCandless will go on to say that they died happy? That they lived their final moments without regret or guilt?

Chris McCandless is not the only one to abandon traditional reality in favor of creating one's own. American naturalist and subject of author Elizabeth Gilbert's book, The Last American Man, Eustace Conway responds to those who critique his life in the North Carolina mountains: "What do I do for a living? I live for a living. When I moved out to the forest 35 years ago, people said "You can't escape reality". I went TO reality. You're living in a virtual reality... People...live in boxes. They wake up every morning in a box of their bedrooms because a box next to them started making beeping noises to tell them it was time to get up. They eat their breakfast our of a box and then they throw that box away into another box. Then they leave the box where they live and get into another box with wheels and drive to work, which is just another big box broken into little cubicle boxes where a bunch of people spend their days sitting and staring at the computer boxes in front of them. When the day is over, everyone gets into the box with wheels again and goes home to the house boxes and spends the evening staring at the television boxes for entertainment. They get their music from a box, they get their food from a box, they keep their clothing in a box, they live their lives in a box".

The debate between socialized reality vs. natural reality is as old as technology itself. There are those who believe that progress (both social and technological) is akin to reality, and those who believe that being connected with the earth, knowing who and what you are, that is reality. Henry David Thoreau, an American writer known for his time spent living alone in the wilderness, reflects on his experience: "Nature here was something savage and awful, though beautiful. I looked with awe at the ground I trod on, to see what the Powers had made there, the form and fashion and material of their work.. Man was not to be associated with it. It was Matter, vast, terrific,- not this Mother Earth that we have heard of, not for him to tread on, or to be buried in,- no, it would be too familiar even to let his bones lie there,- the home, this, of Necessity and Fate. There was clearly felt the presence of a force not bound to be kind to man".

I was reminded of this debate when I went to see new film Captain Fantastic this past weekend. The movie follows the lives of the Cash family, which consists of a father and his six children who live in the wilds of the Pacific Northwest, far away from civilization of any kind. The children are homeschooled on the basis of maintaining a rigorous physical and mental education. In the movie, they come across as geniuses and are referred to by their parents as "philosopher kings", a phrase notable for its use in Plato's Republic, itself hinting at the movie's intellectualism. Despite their lack of association with society, the kids seem joyous, smart, and very much in love with both their father and their lives. But when their mother (who we learn has been in a mental hospital to treat postpartum depression and Bipolar disorder) commits suicide and the family ventures out of the wilderness and into the real world to attend her funeral, they are faced head on with the age-old debate: what is the nature of reality?

It's a thread that runs all throughout the film: as their father debates with various family members over his parenting style, as the children begin to associate with others their own age, as they learn secrets their father was hiding and realize that sometimes idealism and intellectualism just won't cut it. But despite the obvious disparities between their old life and the life they are now coming into contact with, the six kids seem more happy and connected than anyone I know- connected in the sense that they enjoy and understand themselves and the questions they ask about life venture beyond those surrounding social media, high school, or appearance.

It's an idealistic movie, sure. It's difficult to imagine anyone actually living their lives as fluidly as the Cash family. And yet, I loved it. I couldn't help but feel as though I would have liked to be a member of their small clan, and as I left the theater, diet coke in hand and phone in my pocket, it felt almost absurd to be a member of society in the way I was. I call myself connected and intelligent, but I could hardly keep up with even the youngest mind of the family, nor does my frequent use of social media ever make me any happier. In fact, I wake up most mornings feeling tired and disconnected, groggy and unwilling to face the day. I check my phone for emails and head downstairs to eat breakfast that comes out of a box, watching TV on my laptop as I do. And say what you will about technology and societal progress, but nothing about that is real life.

I'm not sure yet whether abandoning society to live in the wild or owning up to being a functioning member of the social body equals reality. I'm not sure I ever will, at least not until I've tried both alternatives. But I do think that we need to take a step back and re-evaluate the way we look at the nature of reality, the way in which we define what is "real" and what is not. Time, money, education- when you really think about, they're all just concepts. Time wouldn't exist the way it does without clocks and alarms, money is really just paper that we have given value, education has been made into a chore that will someday earn you a piece of paper deeming you worthy and valuable. If lived in the woods on my own, I would not be able to survive, to locate food and clean water, to build shelter and protect myself against danger. Without the conveniences of society, I likely wouldn't be alive at all.

And that's a very concerning sentence to have to write.