219113 shoffner - Theme: Hubris/ Risk-taking / Living Deliberately on the Edge

Respond to one of the prompts
Theme:
Hubris/ Risk-taking / Living Deliberately on the Edge
Still, Gallien was concerned. Alex admitted that the only food in his pack was a ten-pound
bag of rice. His
gear seemed exceedingly minimal for the harsh conditions of the interior, which in April
still lay buried
under the winter snowpack. Alex’s cheap leather hiking boots were neither waterproof nor
well insulated.
His rifle was only .22 caliber, a bore too small to rely on if he expected to kill large animals
like moose and
caribou, which he would have to eat if he hoped to remain very long in the country. He had
no ax, no bug
dope, no snowshoes, no compass. The only navigational aid in his possession was a tattered
state road
map he’d scrounged at a gas station.
[p. 5]
When Chris walks into the Alaskan interior with so few provisions, is he foolish, a highly
principled ascetic or something else?
I think that Chris wanted to be as much reliant on the wilderness as he could be. He was