amp34Something will happen to me on Desolation Peakamp8230I can feel it.amp34amp160amp9In the summer of 1956 Jack Kerouac hitchhiked from Mill Valley CA to the North Cascades to spend two months serving as a fire lookout for the US Forest Service. Taking only the Diamond Sutra for reading material he intended to spend his time in deep contemplation and to achieve enlightenment. He wrote in his journal that he planned amp34to concentrate on emptiness of self other selves living beings and universal self.amp34 In letters to friends he proclaimed amp34Something will happen to me on Desolation Peakamp8230I can feel it.amp34amp160amp9Kerouacs experience on Desolation Peak forms the climax of his novel The Dharma Bums and has also been depicted in part 1 of Desolation Angels and a chapter in his nonfiction book Lonesome Traveler. None of these versions offers a full true picture however and for that reason Desolation Peak is essential reading. What separates Kerouac from all other writers is the depth that he went in exploring his own consciousness and what will prove his most enduring legacy is the record he left of that exploration revealing the psyche of a sensitive tortured artist grappling with himself in the mid20th Century.amp160amp9The highlight of Desolation Peak is the journal he kept starkly revealing the depth of his poverty the extremity of his mood swings and the ongoing arguments with himself over the future direction of his life his writing and faith. Along with the journal he worked on a series of projects including amp34Ozone Parkamp34 another installment of the Duluoz Legend beginning in 1943 after his discharge from the Navy amp34The Martin Familyamp34 an intended sequel to The Town and the City and amp34Desolation Adventureamp34 a series of sketches that became part 1 of Desolation Angels. In writing it Kerouac was recommitting himself to his more experimental thenunpublishable style declaring in the journal that amp34the form of the future is noform.