Bird Droppings January 9, 2026
A long drive, pondering solitude

It has been some time since I set down and wrote a totally original dropping. Three of my grandchildren spend the night, as they tend to do on Thursdays, we have supper, play around, and they sleep over. I am always getting late to my sunrise drive when they are here. I like to see them off to school and fix breakfast. I find the solitude of my sunrise photo journeys to be a nice start to the day, even meditative.

“The more powerful and original a mind, the more it will incline towards the religion of solitude.” Aldous Huxley

I really don’t think I have a powerful and original mind. But this thought caught my attention. I have been, and am, a loner for a long time. In middle school, I stopped riding the bus and started walking home the two-mile journey across fields and back roads. I recall a once-in-a-lifetime experience of stepping over an electric fence as I crossed a field. This was a dairy farm near the school, and the fence had never been on. Let me tell you, I thought I was getting castrated for a few seconds as the wire touched my crotch.

“I would rather sit on a pumpkin, and have it all to myself, than be crowded on a velvet cushion.”  Henry David Thoreau

So many thoughts crossed my mind this morning as I drove along. The remaining range on my gas popped up as 107. Sometimes numbers pop up in our lives. I always talk about synchronicity. I just happened to look at my dashboard when 107 was showing up. Back in the day, I was in Boy Scout troop 107 for my scouting career. I received my Eagle Scout award and was the troop leader for a few years. That’s where 107 started. But as I thought, it was the number today: Do I have 107 days left to live, or am I destined to live to 107 like my great-great-grandfather Niper, who lived to be 114.

“I live in that solitude, which is painful in youth, but delicious in the years of maturity.” Albert Einstein

My days are generally spent with myself, and occasionally, my youngest son and I will go for lunch. After school, my oldest son stops in, and we discuss the pros and cons of education. My wife gets home from work, and we have dinner, watch a bit of TV, and go to bed. When the grandkids are here, it’s puppets, Hot Wheels, wrestling, sword fights, stories, Disney Channel, and all sorts of craziness. I guess that makes up for alone time. Next week, I will be getting back on a grad school schedule, doing observation and writing for my master’s program in elementary education. I have a chapter to finish for a new Foxfire book. Writing and photography make me feel busy.  

“Find meaning. Distinguish melancholy from sadness. Go out for a walk. It doesn’t have to be a romantic walk in the park, spring at its most spectacular moment, with flowers and smells, and outstanding poetic imagery that smoothly transports you into another world. It doesn’t have to be a walk during which you’ll have multiple life epiphanies and discover meanings no other brain ever managed to encounter. Do not be afraid of spending quality time by yourself. Find meaning or don’t find meaning, but ‘steal’ some time and give it freely and exclusively to your own self. Opt for privacy and solitude. That doesn’t make you antisocial or cause you to reject the rest of the world. But you need to breathe. And you need to be.” Albert Camus

As I read this passage from Camus, it made sense to me that my solitude is significant and seems to allow me to ponder more and to find the synchronous events in my life—time to see, hear, and smell. Today, as I order around so many thoughts, I think of all the failures in my life. Not really letting it get me down, but could I have done differently? What if I did differently? Perhaps getting older, you tend to wonder if this is my last supper, my last sunrise, my last hug from a grandchild. Then I think maybe if I do this or that, I will last a few more days or years.

“Guard well your spare moments. They are like uncut diamonds. Discard them, and their value will never be known. Improve them, and they will become the brightest gems in a useful life.”  Ralph Waldo Emerson

When I was in high school, I hated literature, except in tenth grade, when we had a teacher who showed us something beyond it. We read 1984, Brave New World, and Anthem. I had a literature teacher tell me my opinion on a paper I wrote was wrong. I did not follow her notes on Moby Dick and see the story as a worldview. I saw Moby Dick as a capture of a short-lived whaling industry. She and I butted heads several times if I disagreed with her thinking. My tenth-grade teacher was let go because of the books we read. I was taken aback by the idea that books can be banned or not approved, yet we can be told our opinions are wrong and graded accordingly.

“Solitude has soft, silky hands, but with strong fingers it grasps the heart and makes it ache with sorrow.” Kahlil Gibran,

“But many of us seek community solely to escape the fear of being alone. Knowing how to be solitary is central to the art of loving. When we can be alone, we can be with others without using them as a means of escape.” Bell Hooks

As I think back through my life so many times, this was how I approached being with people. I would go to the local pub and drink a few beers, talk a bit, and eventually go home and fall asleep. I would get up and go to work. I did that for a few years, as I look back. I go to my Facebook page, and I have over 3000 friends and followers. If you ask me to name a close friend besides my wife, I will struggle to name one.

“Our language has wisely sensed these two sides of man’s being alone. It has created the word “loneliness” to express the pain of being alone, and it has created the word “solitude” to express the glory of being alone.” Paul Tillich

Going back to an interesting period of my life as a student at Candler School of Theology, I was in a class comparing theologies of Paul Tillich and Carl Barth. I found this thought from Tillich this morning, and I liked it. I do not feel alone, but I enjoy my time granted, my pondering gets carried away, and as I get older, my thinking focuses on what-ifs more than it should. But solitude can be a powerful tool if used appropriately. So I will try my best to use my time wisely and go forward.

Ending a drop always seems somewhat awkward. Should I write more or add a PS at the end? The news lately has been devastating to many of us, and I see posts and comments from “friends” applauding the events unfolding. I get tears in my eyes for being so “WOKE’, empathy might be a good thought for tomorrow. My dearest friends who read through the craziness of my wanderings, may peace be with you and yours. Peace be with you all namaste.

My friends

I do not say this lightly,

Mitakuye Oyasin 

(We are all related)

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