On the surface, “A Guide to the Outdoors” by The Heligoats might sound like another indie-folk song about a relationship gone wrong. It has the gentle acoustic guitar, the raw, earnest vocals, and the intimate feel we’ve come to love from the genre. But listen a little closer to the words of frontman Chris Otepka, and a much darker, more complex story begins to unfold.
This isn’t just a breakup song. It’s a chilling, metaphorical masterpiece about what it feels like to be consumed by someone’s fantasy, to have your authentic self tamed, cut down, and used to build a comfortable prison. It’s an exploration of identity, love, and the quiet violence of being misunderstood.
Found in the Woods, But Not Truly Seen
The song immediately sets up a fascinating dynamic. The narrator is “found” by his partner, Aimee, in the woods. This isn’t a chance encounter; it’s an expectation fulfilled.
Aimee, you found me
In the woods
Like you should
Like you do in all those books you read
But never learn.
The woods symbolize the narrator’s true self—wild, untamed, maybe a little messy. Aimee, however, isn’t there to explore the wilderness with him. She’s arriving with a pre-written script, one she’s gleaned from romantic stories. She isn’t seeing him; she’s seeing a character she can fit into her narrative. From the very beginning, his identity is being interpreted and consumed, not appreciated.
The Real vs. The Glossy Fake
The song brilliantly contrasts the narrator’s natural, rooted self with the artificial world Aimee seems to inhabit. He declares he is “one / With the roots, with the air you breathe,” a fundamental part of the living world. Aimee, on the other hand, is associated with magazines—a world of curated, disposable images.
The narrator’s observation is haunting:
And my magazines burn
All the people they turn
Into monsters
But just for a second
And then they’re dead and they’ll leave the earth
Like me.
He sees himself in the fleeting, commodified figures on the glossy pages. He understands that he is also a spectacle, something to be looked at and eventually discarded. His wildness is being turned into a consumable product.
The Ultimate Act of Consumption
If the song has been building a sense of unease, the final verse delivers the devastating climax. The metaphor becomes brutally literal and unforgettable:
You cut me down
You built a house
Then you surrounded yourself with my flesh.
This is the ultimate expression of destructive love. Aimee hasn’t just tamed the narrator’s wilderness; she has annihilated it. She has taken the raw material of his being and used it to construct a domestic, controlled reality for herself. He is no longer a person; he is the four walls she lives within.
The tragic irony is that his unique spirit—his “one screw loose”—was what made him attractive in the first place. It was the very thing that, in the end, was only “used to out live” him, becoming the source of his own metaphorical demise.
Why It Stays With You
“A Guide to the Outdoors” is a song that burrows deep. It’s a powerful reminder that one of the most violent things you can do to a person is to refuse to see them for who they truly are. It’s a cautionary tale about the allure of romantic ideals and the danger of trying to fit a wild soul into a pre-fabricated box. The Heligoats give us a beautiful, melancholic, and ultimately tragic map of a landscape where love becomes consumption, and the self becomes a wilderness to be paved over.
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