Solitude vs. Lonliness

February 10, 2010

I was thinking about the difference between loneliness and solitude as I was walking through the snowy Rock Creek Park. What started as a short walk in 40mph winds to drop off my son at his grandmother's ended four hours later.


I was planning on just wondering around the neighborhood and then I headed west from 5th Street to 9th Street and along to 16th Street and into the drifting, un-plowed snow that accesses the Rock Creek.

At some points, I sunk up past my knees and my thighs started to burn but on I walked
and my energy picked up. I could hear no cars, just the wind and the whisper of my efforts. I could see the houses up on the hill but I started to feel as I was alone.
Once I linked in with the plowed road I headed south on Beach Drive and walked for an hour, on a normally busy road, without a passing car and seeing only three other people. The creek was stunning and the contrast stark with the blue-black water against the pure white snow, the woods were magical. I was at home amongst the solitude, I was not lonely, not even for a minute.

In my mind, loneliness is coming home to an empty house and wishing your lover was there, loneliness is being the wallflower in a crowded room, loneliness did not follow me into the woods. It was stopped cold by the magic of solitude.

Solitude recharges me and I so rarely feel lonely when in the woods, nature is a beautiful companion. My eyes fed me and the sound of the wind and flowing water transported me from Washington, DC, a city I truly love but also a place that often suffocates me. Along the creek, I was home, I was in the White Mountains, I was far away where my soul keeps another address. I needed to walk alone with snow under foot and push my arms out wide to show my respect for this day of perfect solitude, in this perfect space.

I have to feed this need in me and take more solitude in nature, let my intrinsic adventurous spirit out of the city block, out of the city box so my dreams can have a playmate, so my dreams don't go un-lived and unrewarded.