Are you good company for yourself when you are alone?
This is a rather interesting question for us to think about these days, when the flu is likely to drive us into solitary confinement at any time. We grant that solitude under such conditions does not appeal strongly to any of us, and even when we are well we much prefer to have our friends among us. However, times do come to all of us when we have to be alone. Whether we are going to be bored or not at such times, depends altogether on what we put into our lives.
Many of us … do not know the self for whose gain we work so hard. It might be well for us to go off by our “lonesomes” and take an inventory of this part of our being. We would probably feel smaller afterward, as though we had subtracted from our stature the proverbial cubit that we cannot add thereto. What do we store up in our minds to think of? Is it the scandals we hear about other folks, the latest styles, the grubby and sordid worries of our everyday world, the petty dislikes we have, and the ailments and disappointments of our lifetime? Or do we think of the interesting things we have read or heard about, of the beautiful things we have seen, and of the good in other people? Our thoughts may make for us a beautiful day dream or a horrid nightmare.
If we can’t think of at least a dozen things to occupy our minds, we should begin to educate our little selves. Denison offers us the best opportunities ever for this. We have the library on the hill with its hundreds of books about all manner of fascinating subjects. We have hundreds of people who are certainly worthy of our best thoughts. There is the wonderful out-of-doors with its beautiful hills and trees. There is the quaint little town with its steepled churches. Last but not least there is the big Denison spirit of loyalty and brotherhood. This cannot be well defined for it is too big a thing to be described. Something without which we cannot dream our best dreams.
—Denisonian Editorial