Chris's belt

Here you can discuss anything related to Christopher McCandless.
ellisd
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Re: Chris's belt

Postby ellisd » Thu Feb 03, 2011 5:36 pm

T.C.D. hmmm wasn't the girl who was 'ga ga' over him named Tracey? Jan Burress talked about it in the book. maybe theres a connection, maybe not. :?:

pezar
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Re: Chris's belt

Postby pezar » Sat Feb 05, 2011 11:41 pm

He doesn't seem to have been interested in the Tracey who was at the slabs. I don't know about a Tracey in Colorado, there's a lot we don't know about that time period in Chris's life, and I don't know if he was ever in Colorado for any length of time. Jon Krakauer seems to have gone through most of the tale, and didn't find any indications that Chris ever had a girlfriend, on the road or anywhere else. He was friends with that black girl in Annandale, but he never seems to have thought of her in romantic or sexual terms, which is why I think he was autistic, most young males spend enough time around a certain girl they're gonna eventually want sex, but not Chris, he doesn't seem to have cared. I haven't watched the movie but I understand that Sean Penn made Tracey a romantic interest when she wasn't.

scheadhunter
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Re: Chris's belt

Postby scheadhunter » Tue Feb 08, 2011 8:50 pm

Wasn't the girl he met in slab city named Tracy - maybe that was her initials??

GoNorth
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Re: Chris's belt

Postby GoNorth » Thu Feb 10, 2011 12:08 am

scheadhunter wrote:Wasn't the girl he met in slab city named Tracy - maybe that was her initials??


I don't think so. Everything else on the belt seems to be in chronological order, which means that "TCD" was something that happened or someone he met before Astoria, and that was several months before he met Tracy at the slabs.

The book says:

ALEX is inscribed at the belt's left end; then the initials C.J.M. (for Christopher Johnson McCandless) frame a skull and crossbones. Across the strip of cowhide one sees a rendering of a two-lane blacktop, a NO U-TURN sign, a thunderstorm producing a flash flood that engulfs a car, a hitchhiker's thumb, an eagle, the Sierra Nevada, salmon cavorting in the Pacific Ocean, the Pacific Coast Highway from Oregon to Washington, the Rocky Mountains, Montana wheat fields, a South Dakota rattlesnake, Westerberg's house in Carthage, the Colorado River, a gale in the
Gulf of California, a canoe beached beside a tent, Las Vegas, the initials T.C.D., Morro Bay, Astoria, and at the buckle end, finally, the letter N (presumably representing north).


So if it refers to the time between Las Vegas and Astoria, these are just the months without any journal entries. Perhaps it's a place name, or another girl, or T and C and D are 3 different things... who knows.

GoNorth
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Re: Chris's belt

Postby GoNorth » Thu Feb 10, 2011 12:21 am

Hey, I got it. :mrgreen: Just after leaving Las Vegas he got back his backpack, which he had buried underground, including his camera, which didn't work anymore afterwards.
So what about TCD= "The Camera Damage(d)/Disaster/D..."??? :lol:

madmaxx1221
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Re: Chris's belt

Postby madmaxx1221 » Thu Feb 10, 2011 2:24 am

GoNorth wrote:Hey, I got it. :mrgreen: Just after leaving Las Vegas he got back his backpack, which he had buried underground, including his camera, which didn't work anymore afterwards.
So what about TCD= "The Camera Damage(d)/Disaster/D..."??? :lol:


Good Guess that very well could be what it means

madmaxx1221
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Joined: Thu Jan 14, 2010 8:21 am

Re: Chris's belt

Postby madmaxx1221 » Thu Feb 10, 2011 2:31 am

pezar wrote:He doesn't seem to have been interested in the Tracey who was at the slabs. I don't know about a Tracey in Colorado, there's a lot we don't know about that time period in Chris's life, and I don't know if he was ever in Colorado for any length of time. Jon Krakauer seems to have gone through most of the tale, and didn't find any indications that Chris ever had a girlfriend, on the road or anywhere else. He was friends with that black girl in Annandale, but he never seems to have thought of her in romantic or sexual terms, which is why I think he was autistic, most young males spend enough time around a certain girl they're gonna eventually want sex, but not Chris, he doesn't seem to have cared. I haven't watched the movie but I understand that Sean Penn made Tracey a romantic interest when she wasn't.


The black Girls name was Kris Maxie Gillmer. Also she has a Facebook page I stumbled upon it a while ago I messaged her but she never messaged me back. Either she doesn't want to talk about Chris or she hasn't been on FB for a long time.

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=651122450&sk=info

After looking at her profile again it does seem that she is active on Facebook.

I sent her another message telling her about the new book coming out and I gave her the links to this site and the Book Website.

scheadhunter
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Joined: Tue Feb 08, 2011 8:49 pm

Re: Chris's belt

Postby scheadhunter » Fri Feb 11, 2011 2:57 pm

Tracy was just the best guess I could come up with. But true, she was out of the time line on the belt.

It seemed to me from the movie that she wanted to be his romantic interest but Chris refused her advances. The way I interpreted it, he thought she was too young. I wonder if anyone ever tracked her down for any interviews. I don't remember reading anything about it anywhere.

I just couldn't come up with any other ideas of what T.C.D. may have meant. And, like some of the other posts suggest - perhaps it was three separate things and not any one person's initials. We'll probably never discover an answer that is 100% correct.

samas
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Joined: Wed Dec 07, 2011 3:47 am

Re: Chris's belt

Postby samas » Wed Dec 07, 2011 3:55 am

I've wondered this for so long and so much, all I can't think of is the young girl Tracy that was in love with him whom he met at the flea market campsite in Arizona with Burres. Although it didn't seem like McCandless reciprocated feelings for Tracy in the book, I know Westerberg said there were letters sent to McCandless from this Tracy character

ellisd
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Re: Chris's belt

Postby ellisd » Thu Jan 19, 2012 2:41 am

I think it's safe to say T.C.D. has nothing to do with Tracy since her only matching initial is the T in her first name.


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