Chad Adams - Making Nature Sacred: Hideous Wilderness

Before I even read the second section in chapter 1 of Gatta's book, titled "From William Bradford's 'Hideous and Desolate' Wilderness", It had me thinking. As soon as I read the title and saw the words 'hideous and desolate wilderness' a mental picture. I hear hideous, howling, or desolate wilderness and picture a long dark path through the haunted woods or being stuck high in a snowy mountain. Gatta makes good points showing Bradfords reasonthing of this outlook of the wilderness. Points such as how his wife perished and how half of the original Mayflower passengers were dead by the summer following the Provincetown landing. Then my train of thought was directed towards the outlook of wilderness in today's films. There are movies that celebrate and appreciate the wilderness, but it seems to me that something bad always happens in the wilderness in the majority of the movies I've seen. For example, why are there always fights in the woods? Or why is it there's always some one or something watching you behind the bushes and trees while your lost in the woods. Experiencing the woods myself, the fear of being lost, attacked by bears, or any other tragic event always crosses my mind while I'm out in the wilderness, instead of how beautiful and sacred the land is. I think most people will always have a bit of fear instilled in them while in the wilderness, just due to the fact that the wilderness is something you really can't control.
~Chadams