Posted on Facebook 7/27/2021
- written by Stewart M. Green Alone, again. Always alone, but never lonely. The state of the human race: born alone; borne along the current of life; die alone. Lather, rinse, repeat. Sit alone on the edge of the precipice, below the starry starry night sky, beside the lapping ceaseless ocean waves. Sit alone and feel the strength of being alone, of being resilient, of being your own person, of listening to the quiet and feeling its stillness seep into your soul. Yet, we feel lonely. How many people on this blue planet? Almost 8 billion, they say, 8 billion suffering souls and fools, yet still we feel lonely and unloved and friendless and starved for affection and encouragement and love. We feel inadequate; we feel unneeded and unwanted; we feel unheard; we feel the great echoing emptiness of being human and bound to destiny. That aloneness is a gift though. It lets us forge a strong bond with our inner self; it lets us fathom our depths and find our true compass; it lets us unmoor the boat and venture out into the roiling currents, confident and sure of our abilities to navigate rough water. It allows us to be solitary, to meet our battles and forge a fortress of solitude. It allows us to bond with others, with the sacred Other, respecting their solitude and their aloneness on the short journey from the cradle to the grave. I shot this photograph at the Milwaukee Art Museum in August 2004. A meditation on aloneness. |
A meditation on aloneness
- photo by Stewart M. Green |