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Cheryl viewing the fox as a reincarnation of Bobbi

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Cheryl viewing the fox as a reincarnation of Bobbi

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What is one boot without the other boot? it is nothing.

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What is one boot without the other boot? it is nothing.

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"I could feel myself disintegrating inside myself like a past bloom flower... Every time I moved a muscle another piece of me blew away."

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"I could feel myself disintegrating inside myself like a past bloom flower... Every time I moved a muscle another piece of me blew away."

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significant symbol

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Cheryl choosing not to cross the bridge of the gods

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Cheryl choosing not to cross the bridge of the gods

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the grief process, although difficult, can have positive outcomes

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the grief process, although difficult, can have positive outcomes

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the grief process is unique to everyone 

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the grief process is unique to everyone 

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https://docs.google.com/a/cloud.rangitoto.school.nz/document/d/1S1ziWxMSoKFDEEFaXsB5HkjMYTM5fftwSwHASLmkggw/edit?usp=drive_web

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"God is not a granter of wishes. God is a ruthless b*tch"

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"God is not a granter of wishes. God is a ruthless b*tch"

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Symbolic of cheryl's growing understanding as she journeys through grief.
Suggests she is slowly moving to a place of understanding in her grief which parallels with her increased physical strength and ability to carry and bear the weight of “monster” physically, mentally and symbolically.

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Narrative Techniques (Bobbi's Death) pg20-27

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Narrative Techniques (Bobbi's Death) pg20-27

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“I was ravenous for love.” - Vivid or graphic language. Cheryl’s description here is so vivid/graphic that it forces the reader to consider the graphic depiction of ravenous love. The connotations for ravenous being; greedy, starved, devouring. All of which associate with and describe an intense hunger and lust for love.

“Nothing did. Nothing would. Nothing could ever bring my mother back or make it okay that she was gone.” Repetition. Emphasises the true depth of loss, grief, pain, hurt, frustration, heartache that Cheryl experienced with the passing of her mum. The repetition of ‘nothing’ reinforces the sense of loss and nothingness that Cheryl is feeling. It creates a picture of her emptiness for readers and builds on the ‘ravenous’ emptiness, desperation and starvation that is predisposed one page prior in the text.

“I would suffer. I would suffer.” Repetition - again reinforcing the same ideas as above. Connects to ‘ravenous’ in the sense that Cheryl is prepared to starve herself and inflict suffering on herself in her grief and torment.

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What the text reveals about human nature

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What the text reveals about human nature

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The greatest growth comes from hardship, not ease. This reflects one of the most important messages stressed by by Strayed in text - grief is a process of healing and of rediscovering yourself after overcoming devastation.

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Big Ideas Analysis WTS

“I was ravenous for love.” - Vivid or graphic language. Extremely significant idea in the text. This quote is the first clear example the reader can absorb of Cheryl’s deep sense of longing for love and healthy, safe, human interaction. Moving into extended abstract thinking, this extract of the text here sets up all other actions of Cheryl. Everything Cheryl does is driven by her deep sense of longing and desire for love and genuine human interaction as it is clear Cheryl believes that fulfilling this deep sense of longing with false love and fleeting human interaction with be enough to fill the void that she feels in the wake of her mother’s death. “Ravenous” in this regard connects to her “wild” actions that she engages with prior to her walking the PCT and during moments on the PCT. (Examples can be found to further evidence this with her heroin addiction and unhealthy, frequent relationships with strangers. On the trail, her desire “ravenous” love reveals itself less frequently as the trail is slowly allowing Cheryl to understand and heal her need for such a type of love. However, there are moments that can be identified. Her ‘pleasant time’ on the beach and the times where her stream of consciousness let’s us in to see her thinking ‘wild’ and ravenous’ thoughts).

PG26 - Extremely significant idea in the text.

“My brother driving our mother’s car too fast while U2’s Joshua Tree blasted out the speakers.”

U2’s Joshua Tree contains the song; ‘I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.’

A joshua tree, in the christian tradition, is a unique tree because of it’s shape. Biblically, it serves as a reminder of the story of Joshua reaching his hands in prayer to the heavens.

Symbolically, the Joshua tree is a symbol of promise and the promised land.

In the final section of this chapter, Cheryl references all of the above, as well as, her ravenous desire for love, her suffering, her nothing, and the ten thousand things (also the name of the chapter - extended metaphor).

When you combine each of these significant ideas and portions of writing, what the reader can ascertain is that Cheryl was ravenous for love upon the death of her mother. She was completely lost to herself and the world around her, despite her belief that she was searching and filling her void with fake notions of love. In other words, she ‘still hadn’t found what she was looking for’. Upon the moment of her mother’s cancer diagnosis, Cheryl prays “to God, any god” two distinctive prayers. The first being; “fuck them”, the second being “a year”. This holds ties to her symbolic Joshua tree reference as she follows Joshua’s actions in looking to the heavens in prayer.

All of these things put together, with Cheryl’s added repetition; “I would suffer, I would suffer.” further emphasise her desire and desperate search for something deeper both in herself and in the world. In the final lines of this opening chapter, Cheryl states; “The wanting was a wilderness and I had to find my own way out of the woods. It took me four years, seven months, and three days to do it. I didn’t know where I was going until I got there. It was a place called the Bridge of the Gods.” This concluding quote, shows Cheryl’s acknowledgement of the ravenous desires she had in herself to find something deeper in her being and in the world. The stating of the time it took for Cheryl to finally and wholly fulfill these desires is written in a reflective tone and has metaphoric connection to the title of this chapter; the ten thousand things. The combination of the chapter title and Cheryl’s reflective tone ensure that a connection is established between Cheryl, her journey prior to, on, and after the PCT as symbolic of her found unconditional love and understanding. All of which is brought to fruition upon Cheryl’s reaching her end journey of her trail; the Bridge of the Gods, linking back to the Joshua tree and the symbolic promise it holds as an answer to prayer, as well as, an answer to U2’s song. Cheryl, in the opening Chapter of Wild, foreshadows her ending through these symbolic and metaphoric connections, implying that upon her reaching the Bridge of the Gods, her desire for love and human connection was fulfilled because Cheryl was finally fulfilled herself. She found what she had been looking for.

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Cheryl's stages of grief

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“Splitting” Metaphor - extended metaphor. The title of this chapter relates to the physical, mental and emotional splitting that occurs in the aftermath of Cheryl’s mother’s dead. She is literally split from her mother in the sense that she can never see her again. She is split from her family as they continue to separate away from each other in the wake of Bobbi’s death. She is emotionally split between wanting to grieve for her mother and her refusal to believe her mother is gone, thus delaying her grief. Cheryl is also facing further physical splitting through her divorce from Paul, who she still loves but can no longer be with.

“The map would be a confusion of lines in all directions, like a cracking Fourth of July sparkler with Minnesota at its inevitable center.” Simile - the ‘firework’ is a further extension on the extended metaphor that is held within the title of the chapter. The crafting here is implying, just like a firework that splits and explodes in all directions, Cheryl’s life is beginning to do the same.

“We pulled into town in the early evening, the sun dipping into the Tehachapi Mountains a dozen miles behind us to the west.” Personification - describing the day coming to an end prior to Cheryl beginning her hike on the PCT Trail. Also can be seen as metaphoric in the sense that Cheryl is moving into the ending or, close of day, on one portion of her life and is beginning to progress forward night and, following, a new day/beginning.

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Cheryls inability to acknowledge her grief

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Cheryls inability to acknowledge her grief

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At first has negative connotations bit she then makes it positive because of her thoughts on the backpack.

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Safe sex
"I fucked a massage therapist...All 3 of them over the spand of 5 days"

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a physical embodiment of cheryl's grief

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foreshadowing Cheryl's isolation through her grief

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Paul

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"It's either a raven or a crow, a symbol of the void," she added in a mystical tone
"its a good thing ," she said its where things are born, where they begin (foreshadows Cheryl's new life after finishing the walk ?)

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cheryl's Physical and emotional grief

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"I didn't say yes to heroin, I pulled it in with both hands"

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"I didn't say yes to heroin, I pulled it in with both hands"

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"I f*cked a massage therapist ... All three of them over the span of five days

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"I f*cked a massage therapist ... All three of them over the span of five days

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Use of profanity highlights the resentment Cheryl has toward her actions; how vulgar, and pointless they were

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"The universe, I'd learnt, was never, ever kidding."

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Planet heroin. The place where there was no pain, where it was unfortunate but essentially okay that my mother was dead and my biological father was not in life and my family had collapsed and I couldn't manage to stay married to the man I love.

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Planet heroin. The place where there was no pain, where it was unfortunate but essentially okay that my mother was dead and my biological father was not in life and my family had collapsed and I couldn't manage to stay married to the man I love.

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My boots are gone, actually gone

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"My mom was dead. My mom was dead. My mom was dead."

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"If I had to draw a map of those four years to illustrate... my mother's death... the map would be a confusion of lines in all directions, like a Fourth of July sparkler."

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“Each of us locked in separate stalls, weeping. We didn’t exchange a word.”

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finding yourself again sometimes involves doing something out of your comfort zone

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"Nothing did. Nothing would. Nothing could ever bring my mother back or make it okay that she was gone

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A title she hoped for in the early stages of her hike. The naming by other trail hikers was fit however, she no longer dreamed of this name. Shows that at her completion of the trail she has not only overcome the literal challenges presented by the trail, but also her process of grief. She has reached a place of understanding and is able to cherish the memories of her mother from a place of comfort rather than pain.

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My boot was gone. Actually gone

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"I was alone. I was barefoot. I was twenty-six years old and an orphan too."

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"Perhaps being amidst the undesecrated beauty of the wilderness meant I too could be undesecrated, regardless of what I'd lost"

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"Perhaps being amidst the undesecrated beauty of the wilderness meant I too could be undesecrated, regardless of what I'd lost"

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“I didn't feel sad or happy. I didn't feel proud or ashamed. I only felt that in spite of all the things I'd done wrong, in getting myself here, I'd done right.”

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Extended metaphor