"the living and the dying and the heartbreak"

In The Dharma Bums by Kerouac the main characters are narrator Ray Smith (Kerouac) and Japhy Ryder (Gary Snyder). So far themes such as outdoor gatherings to release the spirit, hitchhiking and hiking, jazz clubs, poetry readings, and parties with Buddhist rituals have appeared. The main idea of the book is the feeling of conforming in this world, to look and act a certain way. On page 29 Smith says, "I felt like lying down by the side of the trail and remembering it all. The woods do that to you, they always look familiar, long lost, like the face of a long-dead relative, like an old dream, like a piece of forgotten song drifting across the water, most of all like golden eternities of past childhood or past manhood and all the living and the dying and the heartbreak that went on a million years ago and the clouds as they pass overhead seem to testify by their own lonesome familiarity to this feeling." The woods make Smith feel a certain way, do you think many people would feel the same? Can you relate to his longing of the woods and what they represent or to something that may make you feel this longing towards something else? Keep in mind that it's a "lonesome familiarity" that Kerouac is describing Smith's thoughts as.