By: Blonde One
Our recent DofE Silver ‘style’ expedition was interesting in so many ways. We were expecting to meet all sorts of interesting people and we weren’t disappointed. We met the fantastic Judy and Dave from the Cherrybrook Hotel, we met 2 excellent DofE teams out on the hill doing their Gold expedition, and we met some (obviously) fabulous DofE leaders who were waiting, following and checking their teams. What surprised me though about this trip was how few people we met in the middle of our walking days! There was surprisingly few people/teams/leaders out on the hill at the same time as us. On day one, we passed one team of youngsters and one dog walker before 9am and then didn’t see a single other person until we got to the Cherrybrook at 6pm. Someone at work today asked me if that made me nervous, to be so alone. The answer was most definitely ‘no’. This solitude was perfect and we felt that we had ‘our’ Dartmoor all to ourselves.
What we did see was a larger than usual amount of wildlife. Here’s the list: approximately a million skylark, a deer (amazingly well camouflaged), a lizard (suspected dead), lambs aplenty (very noisy), buzzards, cows, ponies, peacocks (honestly), goats, cats, sheep and several dogs.
Think that’s a common lizard female – the boys are orange underneath – and it doesn’t look mangled, so with a bit of luck, it was a cold-blooded creature waiting to warm up in the sun. Lucky you – been ages since I saw a lizard! They used to be quite common when I was knee-high to a grashopper. We have peacocks – they are a perfect pest in my garden, stealing the bird food and breaking the tables which were never intended for their weight – but I do love their fans, and it can be amusing when the stroll en masse up the road with a queue of drivers crawling along behind them (provided I’m not one of the drivers.)
Ladies, ladies, if I may say so, what wisdom, what instinct, just a few of your easy words can reveal. What joy there is in seeing a recognition I too value.
Solitude is not the same as loneliness. (Repeat).
This is important and needs to be understood.
I have noted that many people are not aware of the difference, so don’t properly understand it. This can allow confusion due to inexperience. The resulting uncertainty can be unnerving, even lead to fear because of incorrect imaginings about what the unknown is truly like. “Goodness me”, the fear may say, “solitude may be the same as loneliness… ooo-errr”.
The likely antidote of course, is to try solitude; it can be discovered as an incredible freedom – a wonderfully soothing condition with the potential to bring surprising new awareness and significant other benefits.
I’m not sure what this condition of closeted unknowing uncertainty is called but I do suspect it’s becoming more common. Personally, I have an idea this is because so many youngsters are so permanently “connected” via PC’s and mobile phones to “social networks” these days – networks that are electronic and “virtual” and thus not as wide, not as permanent, not as closely connected, and not as social as may be thought by those who know no different.
There is little physical reality about an electronic network. It lacks much of the human experience and awareness and education that connection to the greater reality a physical network may bring as an alternative truth to be known.
The flippant “LOL” of a text is not the same as physically being with someone as you share a Laugh Out Loud. The latter is a greater experience with far wider stimulation and benefit – the instinct and sharing communication of body language, the bond of common reaction, the unity of connecting touch, the recognition of shared surroundings and conditions and circumstances. A multitude of real experiences brings a wide human education and understanding – an awareness that a LOL can be a far greater connection if it is shared in a physical sense rather than the more shallow experience of a virtual electronic substitute.
Despite this, a virtual connection is ever-more the experience – the personal security-blanket of human interaction with a world – that our young people are familiar with. Sadly, this is at the expense of experiences that deliver far more fulfilment, far more awareness, far more education, and far more benefit by comparison.
I remember well the most striking example I ever saw of this when a youth was taken as a group into the unfamiliar outdoors where mobile phones were not permitted. The carers of this group were tasked with providing another education, another opportunity for learning. What they were faced with was a group of moaning, insecure young people as a result, deprived of their “normal” world. They had so little familiarity and understanding and grasp of the alternative before them. They didn’t recognise it so didn’t see it – and they certainly didn’t like it! Not at first anyhow. The youth I spoke of was sooo angry about his deprivation. “You can’t take my phone man, you can’t take my phone…”. What fear. What a failure to see the alternative before him.
For many however, a different pattern soon came to bear – and one they liked. A different way to interact – one with a closer connection than available by electronic means alone. Running around – physical exercise, team unity and team competition and the benefits that can bring. The sights and sounds and smells of the world – the real things around them. No smell comes from a PC. No flight of a bird or sudden burst of birdsong invades a bedroom where the PC is tethered. No smartphone screen shows what the 360 degree panorama of nature can provide for eyes to consume and minds to consider.
And then there was the girl sitting on her own, gazing into the distance. “Are you OK?”. “Sure”, she replied, then asking, “Is that the sea over there?”. Yes it was, a few miles distant. “Oh, I’ve never seen the sea before. It’s cool”. How sad is it that a parent – a carer – may spend hundreds of pounds on a smartphone for a child, yet not have spared the cost to let them experience a natural feature most children love and benefit from? Somewhere, somehow, some of our values have become corrupted, diverted, lost. What a shame. The LOL of a text doesn’t make up for it. It seems to me that this one example in a real world was a child recognising just that – all it took was a brief moment of solitude to see another world – the real one available to us all to savour. There was no loneliness in that girls moment of solitude in a world, only wonder and the chance of new learning, new appreciation, and to gain a new benefit. All from a moment of solitude.
I know an adult illustration of these conflicting experiences too. A friend of mine once asked what I was doing at the weekend. Going on Dartmoor. Oh, who with? No-one – just myself (a slight contradiction). Oooh, you wouldn’t catch me doing that! Why not? Well you never know what’s up there do you… Yes, I do actually, that’s why I’m going. I still don’t think he understood, but I did – that’s the main thing. I wasn’t lonely in that solitude either. There was plenty to occupy the mind and body with, all rather enjoyable.
So there we have it – solitude is not the same as loneliness. It can be rather nice. Do continue passing it on to our young people – preferably by experience, not text.
Toodle pip – looks like a nice crisp day for a wander – maybe even snow!
Appreciated all that.
Just spent a weekend with my 7 year old grandson, he knows that when with me there is no need for any electronics [I think he does]. Played loads of traditional games, he loves Bagatelle. Outside in the garden Boules is favorite. I gave him the option of an indoor play area or an adventure up our local fell – he chose wisely. Very excited to relate to his dad later about HIS adventures.
It’s up to us, the old generation, to ‘steer’ the next in a healthy direction.
Yes to all of it! We have just spent the weekend working quite hard on Dartmoor with our youngsters, but I for one have come back feeling renewed because of the response to the environment and to each other that we have witnessed from them.
Blonde wisdom you see … so much for the stereotypes!