there are choices i have made that have undermined the practicality of that wish fulfillment - being a father would head the list - but i have had experiences that have underscored for me the power of being truly alone, and ideally in a place other than my home, my workplace, or anywhere deeply familiar that compel me to recognize the deep need to be alone. i believe that many people experience similar sentiments. particularly those surrounded internally and externally by the demands and expectations of the general public, in whatever form that takes.
i am thinking of one experience in particular on the north yorkshire moors many years ago while tramping my way from derbyshire to the south of scotland on the pennine way. i was walking with two other people - mike and ron - mike a senior bureaucrat in margaret thatcher’s government, and ron a former police officer. we had all met on a previous holiday i had enjoyed in england and had agreed that we would meet in edale (the start of the southern end of the pennine way) a year later on a specific date to take on the 275 miles of the pennine way.
on this particular day we were crossing a particularly treacherous stretch of the pennine way across open moorland scarred with what are called peat groughs. a grough is a feature of the erosion that takes place over years that leaves ditches anywhere from three or four to twenty feet deep across the moors. mike and ron had decided to go ahead for some reason and so left me walking alone with (i’m guessing) some sense of direction because otherwise it would have been foolish for me to have separated from them.
at one point i decided to stop. a heavy fog had set in and i was getting cold. anyone who knows the english damp, knows how quickly it wends its way through whatever layers of clothing you have and gnaws insistently at your bones, digging deep and silently reducing you to a shivering pathetic heap. i headed down the side of a deep grough and sat down and lit up a small burner stove i was carrying and put together a cup of tea. i was sipping on the tea when it suddenly came to me that i was alone. at the bottom of a dark black peat ditch in a thick fog.
alone.
it was silent. mist coiled slowly above my head and some worked its way less thickly into the bottom of the grough. a little fear entered me but just as quickly left. i stayed there about half an hour. i could have stayed longer. i don’t remember everything that i thought about as i sat there, but i do remember thinking about a time when my brother david and i built a tiny little house in a shed that was attached to the house we lived in in altrincham (england).
the little house was built out of pilfered materials from an adjacent construction supply firm. it had wobbly walls, a very unstable roof and a chimney made out of real bricks. of course it collapsed when we both tried to get inside and there was a bit of a scene around the possibility of serious injury but the coziness, the security of building that tiny little wombroom was so worth it. and as i sat at the bottom of the grough thinking about that tiny house i thought how amazing and wonderful and lovely it would be to build that structure - but a really solid and insulated version - right where i was sitting and live there. that’s almost certainly connected to my childhood reading and re-reading of clive king’s children’s book “stig of the dump”.
stig was a caveman who lived at the bottom of an old quarry close to a boy named barney's grandmother's house. since the quarry was no longer in use, people chucked all their garbage down there. barney found stig by falling through the roof of stig's den. barney and stig then had a number of adventures together. it got made into a television series in england in the early eighties apparently.
i’ve been alone at other times. experienced the rush of fear. let it pass. then i’ve heard the inner dialogue begin and the thrill of the openness, of the unlimited freedom that comes with not sharing myself with another person. i have been swept along by the rush of creativity and heightened awareness that comes with the opportunity to actually listen to and address my otherwise crowded out inner dialogue.
solitude is a tempting alternative. i also know how much i crave the immersion in the lives of those i love. a craving not entirely driven by guilt either!
i just wonder what it costs us to be as available as we are?
1 comment:
hi! ali again. you are not alone in your romanticizing of solitude... in fact, i think some solitude is essential to one's well-being. my fantasies of solitude have often involved escaping to the tundra of the far north (in the summer) where there really is no one for miles & miles & one could walk for days & days... i know i have stretched myself too thin when i am dreaming of this. it is healthy -tho not necessarily any easier- to appreciate that we do indeed choose our responsibilities.. i love both extremes - ideally there is a balance somewhere. yes, they are sooo worth it. and, we teach most effectively by example.
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