solitude and togetherness
solitude and togetherness
a reflection on connection
These days I’ve been waking early.
In the blue and gritty light, I walk down to the lake near my house, soak my sandals in the dewy grass. See the sun rise over the harbor. Stare out, mesmerized by the clear reflection of the candy floss clouds in the still water. Feel the warmth of the sun’s golden glow on my skin. Notice a small brown bird flutter between the cattails, chirping brightly to welcome the morning. Breathe deeply.
Then I return home. Sit at a mosaic stone table in the garden with a full french press, journal, 0.38 muji pen. Clay coffee mug in my cupped hands, warming the stiffness from my fingers. Steam rising in the chilly August air. A cluster of lilies beside me, dressed in nothing but soft light. Bees already at work, buzzing in and out. Crack open my journal, spend half an hour trying to trap my thoughts on the page, give them some semblance of shape and substance.
I’ve been settling into these days by myself. Lots of quiet, space, control.
I crave the clarity I find in solitude. Without noise or distraction, I can think. Slow down. Breathe. My mind settles in the silence, expands into the empty space. I get closer to what I think, what I believe. I can reach over what I should value, and grasp what feels true.
Days spent alone are like a mirror: I get a full reflection of myself. There’s no one to blame for my restlessness but me.
_____
Adulthood is this steady dance between solitude and togetherness. Few people are constant fixtures. Most are like actors in a play, coming on and off stage for different scenes. Often unpredictably. Impossibly close at some points, infinitely distant at others.
Salman Rushdie: Our lives disconnect and reconnect, we move on, and later we may again touch one another, again bounce away. This is the felt shape of a human life… this sequence of bumpings-into and tumblings-apart.
For the first twenty-odd years of life there’s structure, continuity, community. Then, at some threshold, everyone is spit out into the world and has to create it for themselves.
I’ve made decisions that have separated me from social context. Writing and reading are solitary. I don’t live with roommates anymore. I don’t feel compelled to live in a city, where most of my friends have moved. I don’t have co-workers. I don’t even have social media.
My friends used to joke that I live under a rock, but this year it’s been a boulder.
I’m bad at calling my parents, texting friends. I’m bad at keeping in touch. I’m bad at missing people. There’s always so much going on to busy my head. An infinite list of things to do, hills to climb, books to read.
Rilke tells me to go into myself, seek solitude, inhabit isolation. To uncover my “innermost instinct” in my “quietest moments”. But he was uncontrollably neurotic, often anxious and afraid, and said his ‘life is full of troubles and sadness’.
Nietzsche similarly seemed to praise loneliness. But, like Rilke, he was no stranger to the depths of darkness.
Their pain makes me question the validity of their guidance and the path solitude may lead me down.
_____
Sometimes it scares me how content I am alone. How unbothered I am to do my own thing. How I don’t feel the urge to keep in touch.
Somewhere I have a sense of pride from not relying on people. From maintaining an image of indifferent independence.
It scares me that I won't prioritize relationships. That I’ll gradually recede further and further into a solitary existence. That I’ll slowly forget the sacredness of friendship.
It scares me because I’ve experienced the bliss of connection. The comfort. The felt sense of unity, of being seen and understood. How it enriches life, suffuses seconds with joy, puts me on an elevated plane of experience I can’t reach alone.
I know how easy it is to forget, but I also know how sacred it is when I find it.
Thank you for reading my writing. I hope this piece made your day a little more beautiful. Please leave a comment, I’d love to hear your thoughts.
Thank you Landon (
) for your invaluable help with this piece.Ps. If you want to support my work, the best way to do so is by sharing it with others who would enjoy it.
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It's rare to find someone so comfortable in solitude. And someone who treasures connection when they chance across it. Love reading your sharing as always, Tommy.
It tickles the innermost parts of my soul. Me attempting to describe how your writing makes me feel LOL.
Beautifully written as always.
Keep on writing,
Landon