Scene is set; now for introductions.

Okay, so now I've set the scene a little bit, I think I'll just go into what I want this blog to be, and a little bit about my experiences with the subject matter from there. I'll preface all of this by saying that I'm going to do my damndest to make the scope of this blog bigger than just me and my experience. I want to try to impart some of the advice I find helpful, and I'll certainly be present in some of these posts, but I also want to engage with the subject matter and other people. Hopefully this isn't going to end up just being all about me. With that in mind:

The blog: I've given this blog the tagline 'a community for loners' and for the moment, that's sort of what I'd like to become here. I'm not expecting anyone to change who they are or anything, but I would like to build up a bit of a hub for people who are feeling like they don't fit in and are perhaps a bit lonely to come and get constructive advice and support. I know that through my own journey I could have used some - more on that in a moment.

Primarily, I am going to be using this blog as a bit of a creative space and a place to stash useful advice from others, as well as a log of my experiences pertaining to isolation, introversion, solitude, self sufficiency, and other situations of that ilk. I'll say for the record that I'm NOT going to be wasting time miserating on the condition of being alone - though depression has been a feature of my journey (which is going to be touched on), I'm satisfied with where I am at the moment.

By it's nature though, solitude can be a hard situation to navigate, so hopefully there's something here to offer to those who need it. I'm hoping that's painted a clear enough picture of what I want to attempt here. It's a bit of a hard ask, but it's something I've been doing a lot of thinking on, so hopefully it comes off. If not, at least I'll be sorting myself out.

Me: My bio in the sidebar of this page should tell you enough to get a pretty good picture of who I am, but in relation to my experience with isolation, I've had a pretty long run at it. I have lived independently of my parents since I was 15, and have only had relatively intermittent contact with them and the other two members of my family since then. I lived in rural and minor metropolitan settings and recently relocated to the capital city of the state to pursue study. I now find that though people are in close proximity, personality and monetary restrictions mean I limit much of my contact with other people (let's not oversell it; I still have a few friends).

Since leaving school I have had a couple of relationships that ended due to various reasons, my capacity for internalizing problems and emotions being one of those. My longest stretch being single lasted for just over 5 years. The rural setting, lack of social support, and a couple of bad relationships have culminated in my looking at this particular period of my life as a healing experience; this is part of why I decided to start this blog. At the moment I live with one other person, next doors' cat is my main company, and I'm sitting on a verandah in the middle of the night with no lights on, writing this.

I'll try to update this as often as I can write something worthy of being read. At this point, I'll say that's going to be weekly.

The Beach

The sun beat down upon the broad stretch of sand as we pulled up to the park behind it that morning. The sun was only just over the rim of the world, but it still lashed the sand with heat that rippled off it. She looked over at me and grinned. She was a surfer, and the white tipped waves were in full swing out on the water. I smiled back, looking forward to seeing what she could do with the board. Covertly I was also looking forward to seeing some spectacular wipeouts as well. She hadn’t been into the water for a while. She had broken her leg once a few years ago and had almost rebroken it once or twice when she’d gotten back into a car. She forgot things.

‘Let’s see how I go…’

I took a moment to look out over the breakers before I replied.

‘Should be fun.’ Ten seconds later, we were both out of the clapped out old station wagon and she was tearing at the straps holding her board to the roof rack whilst I opened the boot and fumbled for some sunblock and towels. I freed a pair of faded ones from the sea of clothes and crap that we’d been living out of for the last however long, then began to paw through, looking for the bottle. It was a mark on how messy the back of the car was when she managed to get the board off before I found what I was after. I heard her footsteps beating the carparks’ dirt, and looked around the boot. She was already halfway across the park, huge yellow board ready.

‘Aren’t you gonna help me?’

‘See you down there, honey,’ the words floated back to me in the mid morning stillness. I shook my head and went back to my task.

I was left alone at the back of the car, hunting the sunscreen through a total mess of life. Eventually I found it, then straightened and moved towards the beach. I was struck, just then, by how empty the scene was and how we seemed to be the only things consciously alive for the moment. I stopped at the edge of the carpark and turned slowly, looking through the whole panorama of where I was. Night still faded towards the West, over the land. I could faintly see a star still shining there. The shore breeze swept in and shook the eucalypts and pandanus that clustered in around the clearing for the cars, seeming to move as one entity all around me. Sunlight shone in, and I noted that the sky was still pink with morning. I was totally alone, and as I turned, a horrible anxiety hit me. It is hard to describe even now, but for some reason I turned back to where I was meaning to go, and leapt onto the grass of the park. The sheer scale of the world around me crashed in at that moment, and I wanted to be gone from the place. Behind me, the star faded.

The edge of the beach was distorted with heat when I came to it, and the breeze that rippled it blew over me and cooled me as I took in the vista. The sky was immense above us, and the few clouds that were there moved in on the breeze. I savored the color changes the sun wrought on them for a moment, that odd fear subsiding and already half forgotten. The sea stretched away before me, out into eternity it seemed just then, and to either side of me were the rocky walls of the bay we’d decided to come to. Even these seemed huge and beautiful in the morning light, and I took in first one, then the other, and wondered in a vague way how long they’d stood here and seen this spectacle of morning. Beyond the dark line of the tide, the girl that I’d come with seemed a tiny speck against the volume of nature that we were presented with here. I was pleased to see her, and the last part of my fear dissolved as I saw her paddling out, oblivious to me. Her yellow board was like a beacon in amongst the shifting mass of water, and after a minute of taking in the scene, I jogged across the burning sand to the cooler stuff the tide had wet down, and sat for a while to keep watching.

I sat down on the beach, and watched her for a while.

She surfed without any pattern or need for one, and I clapped when she rode well and laughed when she fell off. Behind her, the great ball of the sun rose slowly and steadily, and gradually the crisp feeling of the new day fell away and the heat increased. I sat and considered how simple our enjoyment was here, and was thankful that we’d come down at the time we had. This thought led me to fulfill my own desire for enjoyment, and I got up and began to walk down the beach alone. The sun and sea were on my right, the dark rustling green of the park and open forest beyond to my left. Noise moved through the air from both sides, and before me stretched the dark yellow of the wet sand. Immediately I saw a darker patch in the shadowy headland that lay at that end of the bay, and I decided that it would be my destination. I strode for a while, curving down to the waterline to wet my feet in the cold brine, and left a single set of prints behind me in the sand. All the time, the noise filled the air and the behemoth of rock before me loomed larger in my vision. I never looked back, secure in the idea that she’d be amused for a while longer, and fell to listening, smelling and feeling my surroundings as I moved, soaking up everything. The sun was warm, the water and breeze were cold. The waves crashed near the shore, but always there was the more terrestrial rustle of the forest, huge in the air. I smelled the salt, felt the sand grind underfoot, and soaked it all in consciously, willing it to be remembered. After what seemed like not long enough, I stood at the edge of the shadow, and the hole in the rock was a deeper pool of darkness therein.

The climb up to the cave was short but hard, and I was sweating by the time I hauled myself over its’ sharp lip. I was high above the beach, and though I was panting and warm, I still shivered. There, in the shade and away from the sun, the rock seemed to suck the heat away from me and down into itself, to what purpose I couldn’t know. I took a moment there and cast my eye out over the beach, and was pleased with what I saw. The beach, the forest, and the headland at the other end of the bay all lay before me, and along with the clouds everything moved with the invisible breeze. In the midst of it all, the yellow slash of her board swung and slashed through waves. I turned away after that, and made my way carefully into the mouth of the cave I’d found. I wondered what I would find there. I had only made it a little way in, perhaps ten paces, when the keening of the wind over the lip I’d hauled myself over began to wail at my back, and the odd fear that I’d felt so recently began to return. I did not turn, nor did I move at all. Before me lay shadowclad rock, and I suddenly got the feeling that I was heading far away from all that was alive, and gravitating towards something that was at best dead and at worst something between the two. My mind went into freefall. The sound of the wind welled up in that space, and suddenly I shivered more. The rock was cold beneath my sandy feet, and I could see something the color of bone lying deeper inside the dark confines of the place I’d come to, on the ground. My mind began to spin, frightened. Even now I cannot explain the exact trigger or even parameters of the feeling. I felt very alone, very cold, and very, very far from anything meaningful. Anxiety held me to the spot for a few moments more, and I thought I saw movement there in that dark place. At that I turned and fled out of the cave, away down the rocks, and ran for a small while back up the beach, in the sun. I still cannot say what gripped me in that cave that morning, but I hope that whatever it was leaves me to my little life, and doesn’t pay me any more mind.

I sat on the beach for two hours, lathered in sunscreen and under the towels I’d bought down, and watched her. I laughed when she fell off and clapped when she rode well, and enjoyed the simplicity of the moment. She paddled into the shore eventually, and ran up to me with the board under one arm, smiling broadly.

‘Havin’ fun, honey?’

‘Lovin’ it, mate,’ I replied, smiling back.

The sun sparkled off the sea, her hair, and still beat down upon us.

The Fable of the Spurned Herd

Long ago, there existed a little village at the edge of a forest. There was an inn, and a church, and all around the village there were farmers, who grew crops and raised animals. These, the villagers would eat, and some of the animals would make things like milk and eggs for the villagers. It was a good village, at least for a time. One day, without warning, the villages’ animals began to give birth to sickly, twisted young – it began in the sheep first, and the wise men and women of the village were called out into the fields to sort out what to do about the problem of the twisted young. It was decided after much discussion that the townspeople couldn’t in good conscience kill the young, as this would bring more bad omens to the village – for that is what they decided the twisted births were. It was decided that the children would lead the twisted young animals away from the village at feeding time, and then slip away, and nature could take its’ course. This would remove the ill omen from the village, but not make them guilty of the deaths of the young animals, who were foul and abnormal in their eyes. And so, the next night, when it came time to feed all of the animals, the children were given instructions to lead the twisted sheep down the road that led into the forest, and feed them once they were deep in the woods. This the children did, and they left the poor animals there without regret, because they were children acting on their elders’ orders and didn’t know any better. This left the little animals alone, with no one to care for them, in a very dark wood. Now, it just so happened that in that wood, there lived a troll, who was out fossiking for food that night. He found the little group of animals huddling fearfully in the clearing the children had bought them to, and he waked out into it. He bent his trollish body down, and asked one of the lambs, ‘Why are you out here in the wood, little one?’, and the lamb understood him, because trolls had learned to speak the languages of the animals.

‘We were bought here to eat dinner, but we were left here because we are ugly,’ replied the lamb, ‘and now we fear we are to become dinner ourselves’.

To which the troll laughed, and replied,

‘No little one. That’s not the way things happen in my wood. Nor are you ugly, any of you here. You are all exactly as you were intended to be’. And with that, the troll stood up, and he bade the little herd of animals follow him, and then he struck a magic match that burned all night, so he could lead the animals back to his house.

The years began to roll by in the forest, and the little herd of animals lived with the troll in his house, which was really a big cave, deep in the darker part of the woods. They had meadows to eat in, and cold, clean water to drink. The troll looked after the herd that the villagers had spurned, because he had been alone for a very long time, and he enjoyed the company. He led them about, and made sure they were safe. At night, he always made sure there was a fire so the herd wouldn’t get scared, and he warded off the wolves that sometimes came down from the mountains. When one of the animals got sick, he tended it, and he told them all about how things in the forest worked, because he’d had a lot of time to work those things out. Eventually the little herd grew into adulthood, and though they still looked different physically, they were strong and healthy, and happy. Every now and again, the troll would find new animals in the woods, because the people from the village were still finding them amongst their own herds. They didn’t realize that the different-looking animals that were being born were just a natural part of life, and not something to be shunned and spurned. The herd grew, and eventually, one day, a little girl led the animals too far away from the village, and she got lost in the woods at night. The troll went to her and said, ‘Don’t be frightened, I have taken your animals, and looked after them. Come stay the night with me, and I will take you to the forests’ edge in the morning. You will be safer there than if I led you there when we can’t see’, and he was right, because he’d run out of magic matches. At first the little girl was scared, but then she listened to him, and grew curious, so she agreed to go to his cave. Inside, she did indeed find all of the animals that the villagers had taken into the woods. They didn’t know what to make of her until the troll told them who she was, and then they crowded around to smell and make their noises at her, because she reminded them of their first home. As they got close, the little girl reached out and touched one of the elder animals, and she found that it’s coat was as smooth and thick and shiny as the very best of the animals in the village, because they had grown up free and with the very best grass to crop on. For their part, the animals did not bear any ill will towards the little girl, because they knew that the people in the village were only doing what they thought to be right, and the children weren’t to blame. In any case, they had been given good lives with the troll in the forest, so they really couldn’t complain. The little girl walked amongst the spurned herd and touched each of them in turn, and was amazed by how soft and strong, but gentle each of the animals were. Now that they’d grown up, their unique bodies, which had seemed so sickly and bad in infancy, had now become a way to tell each one apart, so their personality could be identified easily. This was very different to how things were in the village, where the animals all looked and acted the same. Once the little girl had walked through the herd, and each animal had been touched and gotten a smell in turn the troll set up a bed for her very near the fire, so she could keep warm. The troll gave her milk from the herd, and some berries he knew people could eat. The milk, too, was the most delicious the little girl had ever had, and it helped her get to sleep and dream good dreams. The troll sat at the mouth of the cave, as he often did, and waited for the dawn. In the morning, the little girl woke up, and the animals bore her home on their backs, which were strong and comfortable. At the edge of the forest, she climbed down to the ground, and asked the troll, ‘What will I tell my village when they ask where I’ve been?’ and the troll replied,

‘Tell them that their animals are all here, and that they miss their fields and family’. And the little girl nodded, then thanked the troll and the spurned herd for having her, and ran back to the village. No one had gone looking for the little girl because she had no mother or father, and no one was willing to risk themselves looking for a girl no one was connected with. Nevertheless, when she scampered up to the gates, a great commotion was had, and all of the elders in the village wanted to know where she’d been, and why she wasn’t crying or sad.

‘Because,’ she said, in the way children address adults who don’t know any better, ‘I was with the herd of animals that we put in the forest for the troll to look after’. This caused more commotion in the village, for the elders had never thought that the animals they had the children take there would survive for very long, never mind thrive and take care of little girls who got lost in the woods. Nor did they ever conceive that a troll should take care of either animals or little girls.

‘You must take us to the forest and show us this troll and his herd,’ said the elders, and the little girl did, because she had little choice.

Once the villagers all got to the edge of the forest, the troll walked from the trees to stand before them, because he’d known they’d want to see with their own eyes the little girls’ troll, and he’d waited for them. Such a brazen revealing made the townsfolk all draw the weapons that they’d bought with them, for they feared the monster, but the little girl stepped forward and said,

‘This noble troll kept me safe last night, and I had no weapons or anything to give him. Please don’t fear him.’ This stopped the townsfolk from attacking straight away, but they kept their swords out, because they had always been told that trolls were dangerous beasts. The elders stepped forward and asked the troll,

‘Why did you look after this girl? And where are the animals you keep?’ to which the troll replied,

‘Because she needed the help, and she hadn’t done anything to me. And I keep no animals,’ he said. ‘They keep me. They keep me happy and fed, and they give me company in the woods. They are my friends, and though you put them there because you thought there was something wrong with them, there wasn’t. They’re just different.’ And with this, the animals began to walk out of the trees and let the townsfolk look upon them. They all moved exactly how they were meant to, and though they were animals, the people could see that they were very different from the uniform beasts of burden that they kept back home. The animals walked towards the villagers, and the villagers reached out and touched the animals. They saw that they were strong, and their coats were beautiful, and they were gentle. They hadn’t really needed to be shunned, they just needed to be taken care of in a different way, which the troll had done.

‘What do the animals want now?’ asked the elders of the troll, whilst the people made friends with the animals for the first time.

‘They want to be free to go home to their families. Their families did not exclude them from your herds – you did. And they miss them.’ Said the troll. The elders could not fault that, so they decreed,

‘From this day forth, all of the animals in the spurned herd shall be allowed onto our villages’ fields, so they can keep their families close, and the troll of the forest will ever after be a friend of the village, for showing us that things that are different are not always bad.’ And from then on, all of the animals of the village and forest were able to travel between the two, and know their families, and keep the troll who had shown them such kindness company. The bloodlines of the herd were made stronger by those who had been spurned, and through acceptance, that village became more peaceful and prosperous than it ever had or could have been.