Here's chapter 7!!
Chapter 7
In Carthage, Krakauer interviewed Westerberg fifty days after McCandless’ body was discovered. He’s trying to fix a combine that keeps breaking down. McCandless appeared one day in March saying he was ready for work. He was going to be in Fairbanks by the end of April, but he’d be back for the fall harvest. For those four weeks he was back, he did every job thrown at him. However, when Westerberg tried to give McCandless a try at the combine, it was obvious he wasn’t good with machines. Westerberg said that you could say McCandless didn’t have a lot of common sense. Westerberg introduced McCandless to his girlfriend, Gail Borah. She cooked him dinner and he talked to her a lot about things.
McCandless confided a lot into Borah, but never really talked about his family, except his younger sister Carine. Westerberg said that he didn’t get what was going on between McCandless and his parents, because whatever it was, Westerberg had seen worse.
McCandless rebelled against his parents’ control, and their way of life. In Carthage, he got a lot of letters, even some from a girl who had a crush on him he met in some camp. Westerberg doesn’t remember McCandless ever having girlfriends; and Borah too. His sister, Carine, says she couldn’t think of anyone outside of Borah that he ever went dancing with. She remembers, one time, in high school, McCandless got drunk and tried to sneak a girl home, but they made so much noise everyone woke up. McCandless seems to have been celibate throughout high school and even into college. Many of the quotes he marked in Tolstoy’s Kreutzer Sonata and Thoreau’s Walden have to do with celibacy.
McCandless was planning on being back for fall, and the way he talked about the Alaska trip made Westerberg believe that this would be his last great adventure. Westerberg tried to get him to stay for an extra ten days, but it was no use. He even offered to buy McCandless a plane ticket, but McCandless said that that would be cheating. Two nights before he left, he had dinner at Westerberg’s mom’s house. They talked for five hours about books. She said that it’s amazing how short a time she met him, how much his death affected her. The night before he left they had a big party at the Cabaret, a local bar, and McCandless played the piano all night. He said goodbye in the morning, and cried when he hugged Borah, which she admitted made her think something might go wrong and this might be the last time they saw each other.
McCandless got a ride to the highway and started hitchhiking. The tractor driver thought that, with his machete, nobody would pick him up. He also left his journal and belt with Westerberg for safe keeping. On April 18, 1992, he sent a postcard to Westerberg saying he made the Alaskan border. On April 27, 1992 he wrote Westerberg from Fairbanks. He said it would be the last he’d hear from him. He ended with “I want you to know you’re a great man. I now walk into the wild.
He also wrote Jan and Franz that same day. It reads “Hey Guys! This is the last communication you shall receive from me. I now walk out to live amongst the wild. Take care, it was great knowing you. --- Alexander.”
