Solitude
Neuronormative society seemingly believes solitude unhealthy and that urban living equals happiness. Not from an autistic point of view. The sereness of nature and solitude of mind and body has had a long tradition within literature, from the idyllic pastoral life of the Romantic Period to the eco-facist arguments of Blut und Boden (blood and soil) and redemtion of the soil to the trend Cottage Core during the Covid pandemic, to be brief. Nature has been seen as a balm to illness and mental instability for eons, but especially emerging as society moved from the country to the city in search of prosperity or labor. The countryside became idealized and somewhere city folk went for rest and recreation (Oscar Wilde, Charles Dickens, Johanna Spyri, Trygve Gulbranssen, Thomas Hardy) to escape urban monotony. American writer and naturalist Henry Thoreau famously embodied The Return to Nature as he built a log cabin by Walden Pond outside Boston (detailed in his 1854 book Walden ) and ...