| OCR Text |
Show RIVER me while reading Huck's book that the river was still there, still flowing and free. One way or another you could build a raft at one end and drift down to New Orleans. The idea was like a spark and my mind was a tinder dry prairie: soon there was fire to the horizon. The idea became an obsession and soon I was determined to descend the Mississippi River. / As a college student from suburbia and with nothing to could hang an identity upon, if s not hard to comprehend my motives. I knew practically nothing about the real world, let alone the remote backwaters of the American South. This journey would push me to the limit, and I hoped to find myself somewhere beyond the borders of my safe life. I had evolved a complex and probably drug-inspired theory about fantasy and reality. We created reality out of imagination, at the balancing point of our lives where fantasy intersected reality, at the point of ultimate freedom. With the total certainty of late adolescence, I believed that reality was plastic, fluid, and molded from imagination. I was young and bold enough to believe I could do whatever I could dream. To a point, it worked, and it was exhilarating. The trip appeared to be the answer to all my problems. It would take me through the heartland of America, away from the asphalt and insanity of California, not only to another place but to another time. It would take me back to nature (though I could only imagine how close) and, mystery of mysteries, it would take me to the American South. In 1969, the South looked to be an uncharted wilderness and the Mississippi appeared as dangerous as the Amazon, the large difference being that the natives were armed with shotguns instead of poison darts. My academic and media-born notions led me to believe I was going into America's heart of darkness where I could find a vanished past. I -43- |
