The Complete Elizabeth Gilbert: Eat, Pray, Love; Committed; The Last American Man; Stern Men & Pilgrims (77 page)

There’s an arrogance to such an attitude, but—more than that— there’s a profound alienation. We have fallen out of rhythm. It’s this simple. If we don’t cultivate our own food supply anymore, do we need to pay attention to the idea of, say, seasons? Is there any difference between winter and summer if we can eat strawberries every day? If we can keep the temperature of our house set at a comfortable 70 degrees all year, do we need to notice that fall is coming? Do we have to prepare for that? Respect that? Much less contemplate what it means for our own mortality that things die in nature every autumn? And when spring does come round again, do we need to notice that rebirth? Do we need to take a moment and maybe thank anybody for that? Celebrate it? If we never leave our house except to drive to work, do we need to be even remotely aware of this powerful, humbling, extraordinary, and eternal life force that surges and ebbs around us all the time?

Apparently not. Because we seem to have stopped paying attention. Or this is what Eustace Conway perceives when he looks around America. He sees a people who have fallen out of step with the natural cycles that have defined humanity’s existence and culture for millennia. Having lost that vital connection with nature, the nation is in danger of losing its humanity. We are not alien visitors to this planet, after all, but natural residents and relatives of every living entity here. This earth is where we came from and where we’ll all end up when we die, and, during the interim, it is our home. And there’s no way we can ever hope to understand ourselves if we don’t at least marginally understand our home. That is the understanding we need to put our lives in some bigger metaphysical context.

Instead, Eustace sees a chilling sight—a citizenry so removed from the rhythms of nature that we march through our lives as mere sleepwalkers, blinded, deafened, and senseless. Robotically existing in sterilized surroundings that numb the mind, weaken the body, and atrophy the soul. But Eustace believes we can get our humanity back. When we contemplate the venerable age of a mountain, we get it. When we observe the superb order of water and sunlight, we get it. When we experience firsthand the brutal poetry of the food chain, we get it. When we are mindful of every nuance of our natural world, we finally get the picture: that we are each given only one dazzling moment of life here on Earth, and we must stand before that reality both humbled and elevated, subject to every law of our universe and grateful for our brief but intrinsic participation within it.

Granted, this is not a radical concept. Every environmentalist in the world operates on a philosophy based on these same hypotheses. But what sets Eustace Conway apart from every other environmentalist is the peculiar confidence he’s had since earliest childhood that it is his
personal
destiny to snap his countrymen out of their sleepwalk. He has always believed that he alone has this power and this responsibility, that he was to be the vessel of change. One man, one vision.

And this was his precise vision—that, one by one, Americans would come to his mystical utopia in the woods. There, under his guidance, they would shed the frailty, ignorance, and pettiness brought about by their contemporary upbringing. Using his charisma as a lure, he would lead people back into the wilderness, uncoil their blindfolds, point them toward the stunning vista of the unspoiled frontier, and say, “Behold!” Then he would stand back and watch the awakening.

Eustace always envisioned groups of children coming to participate in primitive summer camps, but he would also welcome adults— apprentices—who, for extended periods of time, would seriously study a natural way of life under his leadership. Of course he knows it’s impossible to drag every single American into the woods with him, which is why he is also committed to going out into the world with his message and delivering the woods directly to the people himself—carrying the very smell of the wilderness in his hair and on his skin and within his words. He would preach and teach his doctrine in every school, at every state fair, in every mall and parking lot and gas station he could find. He would passionately speak to any businessman, baby-sitter, housewife, hooker, millionaire, and crackhead in America.

With Eustace’s energy and through his example—he has always been certain of it—Americans would gradually be transformed. They would grow and learn and once again be strong and resourceful. Then they would leave Eustace’s side and disseminate their newfound knowledge among their brethren. In this evangelical manner, Eustace Conway’s vision of perfect concordance with nature would spread and spread across families, towns, counties, and states until we would all be living like Eustace—growing our food, fabricating our clothes, making fire with two sticks, and recognizing our blessed humanity. Thus both our grand nation and our sacred planet would be saved.

That was his plan, anyway.

Audacious? Sure. Still, there
is
something about the guy . . .

Eustace is not easily dismissed. As his brother Judson would attest in awe, and as I later came to witness in person, Eustace’s skills in the wilderness are truly legion. He is wildly competent. He is physically and intellectually predestined to acquire proficiency. He has perfect eyesight, perfect hearing, perfect balance, perfect reflexes, and perfect focus. He has long muscles on a light but strongly constructed frame, like a natural middle-distance runner. His body can do anything he asks of it. His mind, too. He has to be exposed to an idea or shown a process only once to get it right, to lock it in, and immediately begin improving on its principles. He pays closer attention to his surroundings than anyone I’ve ever seen. His mind operates, as Henry Adams wrote of the minds of the earliest American settlers, like “a mere cutting instrument, practical, economical, sharp, and direct.”

And that kind of mind makes for a hard honesty. So that when I once asked him, “Is there anything you
can’t
do?” Eustace replied, “Well, I’ve never found anything to be particularly difficult.” In other words, he’s got the self-assurance to back up his conviction that he can change the world. That, in addition to the unshakable will and airtight world view of a natural-born reformer. And he’s got charisma, too, which he unleashes brazenly in every interaction he has with anyone.

I first visited Eustace at Turtle Island back in 1995. Midway through my stay, Eustace had to leave the mountain, and I went with him. He had to leave the woods, as he often does, to teach
about
the woods, to make some money and spread the gospel. So we drove across North Carolina to a small summer camp that specialized in environmental education. A group of teenagers skulked into the camp’s dining room for the evening’s event, and to me they all looked like jerks—loud, disrespectful, shoving, shrieking, laughing. Eustace was supposed to get these kids excited about nature.

I thought,
This is not gonna end well
.

Eustace, wearing jeans and a plaid shirt, not buckskin, walked across the stage toward the microphone. Around his neck hung two large coyote teeth. On his belt, the knife.

The shoving and shrieking and laughing continued.

Eustace, thin and serious, stood at the microphone with his hands in his pockets. After a long moment, he said, “I am a quiet-spoken man, so I am going to have to speak quietly tonight.”

The shoving and shrieking and laughing stopped. The jerky teenagers stared at Eustace Conway, riveted. Just like that—dead silence. I swear it. It was like goddamn
To Sir with Love
.

“I moved into the woods when I was seventeen years old,” Eustace began.“Not much older than you are today . . .” And he talked about his life. Those kids were so transfixed, you could have operated on them and they wouldn’t have noticed. Eustace told them about wilderness survival and his adventures, but he also gave his speech about the difference between the world of boxes and the world of circles.

“I live,” Eustace said, “in nature, where everything is connected, circular. The seasons are circular. The planet is circular, and so is its passage around the sun. The course of water over the earth is circular, coming down from the sky and circulating through the world to spread life and then evaporating up again. I live in a circular teepee and I build my fire in a circle, and when my loved ones visit me, we sit in a circle and talk. The life cycles of plants and animals are circular. I live outside where I can see this. The ancient people understood that our world is a circle, but we modern people have lost sight of that. I don’t live inside buildings, because buildings are dead places where nothing grows, where water doesn’t flow, and where life stops. I don’t want to live in a dead place. People say that I don’t live in the real world, but it’s modern Americans who live in a fake world, because they’ve stepped outside the natural circle of life.

“I saw the circle of life most clearly when I was riding my horse across America and I came across the body of a coyote that had recently died. The animal was mummified from the desert heat, but all around it, in a lush circle, was a small band of fresh green grass. The earth was borrowing the nutrients from the animal and regenerating itself. This wasn’t about death, I realized; this was about eternal life. I took the teeth from that coyote and made myself this necklace right here, which always circles my neck, so I’d never forget that lesson.

“Do people live in circles today? No. They live in boxes. They wake up every morning in the box of their bedroom because a box next to them started making beeping noises to tell them it was time to get up. They eat their breakfast out of a box and then they throw that box away into another box. Then they leave the box where they live and get into a box with wheels and drive to work, which is just another big box broken up into lots of 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 their 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! Does that sound like anybody you know?”

By now the kids were laughing and applauding.

“Break out of the box!” Eustace said. “You don’t have to live like this because people tell you it’s the only way. You’re not handcuffed to your culture! This is
not
the way humanity lived for thousands and thousands of years, and it is
not
the only way you can live today!”

Another hour of this, then uncontained applause, like at a revival meeting. After the talk, Eustace sat on the edge of the stage, drinking from the glass jug filled with fresh Turtle Island spring water that he carries with him everywhere. The teenagers approached reverently, awed, as the camp director gave Eustace an enthusiastic handshake and a discreetly enveloped generous check. The teenagers gathered around more closely. The toughest, baddest-ass gangsta boy of them all came to stand right beside Eustace. He put his fist on his heart and announced, with real solemnity, “You rule, man. You da
bomb
.” Eustace threw back his head and laughed. The other campers lined up to shake his hand and then detonated with questions.

“Could you make fire right now if you had to?”

“Yes.”

“If someone dropped you naked into the middle of Alaska, could you survive?”

“I suppose so. But it’d be a lot easier if I had a knife.”

“Were you scared when you first moved into the woods?”

“No. The civilized world is much scarier than the woods.”

“Were your parents mad at you when you moved into the woods?”

“My father didn’t know why I’d want to leave a comfortable modern house, but my mother understood.”

“Do you ever get sick?”

“Rarely.”

“Do you ever go to the doctor?”

“Never.”

“Do you know how to drive a car?”

“How do you think I got here tonight?”

“Do you use any modern tools?”

“I use chain saws all the time to take care of my land. I use telephones. And plastic buckets. My God, but plastic buckets are great! I’ve made plenty of my own baskets and containers out of tree bark and grasses—I mean, I know how to do it and I’ve used those primitive means of hauling water around lots of time—but I tell you, there’s nothing like a plastic bucket to get the job done faster. Wow! Plastic buckets! Glorious! I love ’em!”

“Do you have a toothbrush?”

“Not at the moment.”

“Do you have a hairbrush?”

“I used to have a porcupine hairbrush. I don’t have it anymore, though.”

“What’s a porcupine hairbrush?”

“A hairbrush made out of porcupine bristles.”

“Where’d you get
that
?”

“A porcupine saved my life once when I was hiking on the Appalachian Trail, so I made the hairbrush out of its bristles, to honor it.”

“How could a porcupine save your life?”

“By giving me something to eat when I was starving to death.”

Here, there was an extended silence, as the kids tried to figure that one out. Then they all kind of said, “Ohhh . . .” at the same time, and the questioning continued.

“Why were you starving to death?”

“Because there wasn’t any food.”

“Why wasn’t there any food?”

“Because it was winter.”

“What’s the longest you’ve ever gone without eating?”

“Probably the two weeks before I killed that porcupine.”

“Can you show us your porcupine hairbrush?”

“I don’t have it anymore. I brought it to a demonstration like this one, to show it to some kids your age, and somebody stole it. Can you imagine how sad that made me feel?”

“Do you have a gun?”

“I have several guns.”

“Have you ever killed a person?”

“No.”

“Are you married?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I guess I haven’t found the right woman yet.”

“Do you wish you were married?”

“More than anything in the world.”

“Do you ever get lonely out there in the woods?”