{"id":15463,"date":"2026-07-09T09:17:14","date_gmt":"2026-07-09T09:17:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/?p=15463"},"modified":"2026-07-09T09:17:14","modified_gmt":"2026-07-09T09:17:14","slug":"a-lesson-from-dick-proenneke","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/?p=15463","title":{"rendered":"A Lesson From Dick Proenneke"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n<\/p>\n

\n
\n

Published July 9, 2026 03:00AM<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

On the longest solo trip of my life, I stepped off a two-seat float plane onto the rocky shore of Upper Twin Lake in Alaska\u2019s Lake Clark National Park.<\/p>\n

I had taken four flights from New Jersey to Alaska to write about the iconic cabin handbuilt by Richard \u201cDick\u201d Proenneke, the self-taught naturalist whose 30-year solo life in the wilderness was captured in the beloved PBS documentary Alone in the Wilderness<\/i>.<\/a> Proenneke never married, never had children, and spent nearly three decades completely alone, save for the birds he fed by hand and bears that occasionally clawed at his logs.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe must have been lonely out here,\u201d a fellow traveler said during the park ranger\u2019s tour of the cabin.<\/p>\n

On that chilly June morning last year, I found myself wondering the same thing. I was just coming to a different conclusion.<\/p>\n

Park officials told me the cabin has seen a recent uptick in visitors, which they attribute to Proenneke\u2019s newfound popularity on social media, and to a direct flight to the property by an outback flying service. I visited the cabin as a member of a tour group led by two guides. My group included a doctor, a retired attorney, a veterinarian, and a handful of National Parks superfans. Still, I stuck mostly to myself, spending the trip deep in my own thoughts. In Alaska, I wound up pondering a life like Proenneke\u2019s, sans the means or skills to make it happen.<\/p>\n

The Richard\u201dDick\u201d Proenneke Site is located on the southeast shoreline of Upper Twin Lake in Lake Clark National Park and Preserve, Alaska.<\/span> (Photo: National Park Service)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

According to podcasters, writers, polls, therapists, influencers, and anyone else with a mouth or keyboard, there\u2019s a male loneliness epidemic eroding the dated fabric of masculinity, like the snake of patriarchy eating its own tail.<\/p>\n

Remedies for this epidemic are everywhere in the media, with new ones popping up weekly. The New York Times<\/i> wondered if pickleball held the answers<\/a>; others have suggested buying a personal watercraft, joining a mosh pit,<\/a> or taking off your shirt at a college football game, or watching a horror-comedy starring Paul Rudd<\/a>. <\/b>In recent months, brunch, AI-powered companion dolls<\/a>, and Jack Black <\/a>have been mentioned as cures.<\/p>\n

Outside<\/i> wondered whether \u201coutdoor friendships,\u201d volunteering, or getting a pet could work.<\/p>\n

These cures may seem unrelated and even, perhaps, a little silly. <\/b>However, the common theme between them seems to be social interaction, choosing community over individualism, a bowling league or running club over your PlayStation.<\/b><\/p>\n

Some entrepreneurs have even launched businesses to combat male loneliness. A deep-dive earlier this year in the New Yorker<\/i><\/a> revealed how fathers are paying men to turn their sons into \u201calphas,\u201d while others are joining men-only retreats to be screamed at. Men are taking reams of peptides, smashing their cheekbones with hammers, and getting chin implants<\/a> in an effort to chase some warped standard of masculinity.<\/p>\n

Most of these solutions seem alien to the introverts of society, myself included. I\u2019m not sure I\u2019ve ever been lonely, per se,<\/i> or even bored, unless I\u2019m stuck in small talk. I\u2019ve never loved team sports or double dates either. In school, hearing a teacher say \u201clet\u2019s break into groups\u201d made me groan.<\/p>\n

\"Richard
Richard \u201cDick\u201d Proenneke\u2019s iconic cabin in Lake Clark National Park and Preserve, Alaska. <\/span> (Photo: National Park Service)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\n

During my trip to Alaska, I realized that Proenneke enjoyed solitude<\/i> but not loneliness.<\/i> The former feels intentional and rewarding, as opposed to the latter, which causes anxiety and depression. He wasn\u2019t a misanthrope. He welcomed visitors and was thoughtful enough to whittle a variety of walking sticks to match their height.<\/p>\n

Monroe Robinson, author of The Handcrafted Life of Dick Proenneke<\/i><\/a>, spent nearly 20 years living at the cabin and maintaining it for the National Park Service. Robinson knew Proenneke, who died in 2003, at the age of 86. \u201cHe liked when people came to visit,\u201d Robinson told me later in a call, \u201cand he also liked when they left.\u201d<\/p>\n

I can relate.<\/p>\n

My aversions to crowds and clubs have been a source of personal confusion over the years. I\u2019m not a misanthrope, either. As a reporter, I crave deeply personal interactions with others and get invested in the people I write about to a fault. Part of me always thought loneliness was a good way to avoid heartbreak. I\u2019ve loved deeply anyhow, and lost people in my life to suicide and divorce.<\/p>\n

In June of 2024, I learned my then-wife was deeply unhappy in our marriage.<\/b> I had a real breakdown. The ensuing algorithms of online divorce content can be toxic for men, a slippery slope greased by manosphere grifters. Well-intentioned friends and family will often just take your side during a breakup, too, and there\u2019s not much growth in that. So I tried to avoid that noise, choosing to walk inside myself, to find a \u201cvast inner solitude\u201d as the poet Rainer Marie Rilke advised.<\/p>\n

\"f
The Richard L. Proenneke Site is located on the southeast shoreline of Upper Twin Lake in Lake Clark National Park and Preserve, Alaska. (Photo: National Park Service)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I wanted to confront my own bullshit.<\/p>\n

I spent a few dozen nights sleeping in tents for the rest of that year, mostly in the Northeast. Sometimes I slept in single-digit temperatures. I\u2019d reserved a tent site for my wedding anniversary, a campground where I\u2019d wanted to renew my vows. <\/b>But after my marriage began to crumble, I took my young daughter, instead of canceling. I put her in a hiking backpack to slog my way up a few summits. I kept on punishing myself too, on trail runs and difficult hikes, hoping exhaustion would tamp down the urge to beg my ex and anyone who knew her for answers. Bad cell service helped with that.<\/p>\n

(I also found a great therapist, thankfully.)<\/p>\n

On a long-planned family vacation to Southwest Colorado in August of 2024 that I couldn\u2019t afford and couldn\u2019t cancel, the San Juan Mountains loomed everywhere I went. I saw them from the window of my cabin, the dirt roads I drove along with my kids, and the hammock where I finished The Snow Leopard<\/i>, in which author Peter Matthiessen joins an expedition to find the mythic beast in Nepal after the death of his wife.<\/p>\n

The mountains felt timeless and unavoidable there, and they spoke to me, a perfect epilogue to the book\u2019s zen message.<\/p>\n

\u201cAccept what\u2019s happening\u201d they said.<\/p>\n

And so I accepted that my marriage was over.<\/p>\n

In May of 2025, the divorce was finalized. A few weeks later, I was in Alaska as a freelancer, pinching myself as my plane touched down on the icy, blue lake.<\/p>\n

Robinson, when I asked, said \u201cfeeling lonely was not a thing\u201d for Proenneke. He was too active, too busy trying to survive. Proenneke left society, yes, but he didn\u2019t withdraw from life. In the long winters, when no sun hit Proenneke\u2019s sod roof, when no planes landed on the frozen lake, he would spend months penning thoughtful letters to close friends, family, and his growing legion of fans.<\/p>\n

\"Inside
The author sits at the desk of Richard \u201cDick\u201d Proenneke in his cabin he built by hand.<\/span> (Photo: Courtesy of Jason Nark)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Proenneke cared about his cabin\u2019s appearance too, about beauty, and that matters. He built a stone fireplace, an extra bunk for guests, and hand-carved a much-beloved Dutch door. Windows would be an inconvenient luxury in a trapper\u2019s cabin in Alaska, but Prokenneke fashioned one that offered a grand view of the lake anyway.<\/p>\n

While I was contemplating Proenneke\u2019s contentment in Alaska, I was also watching contentment in action with the two young guides in charge of us there. For a moment or two, I envied both of them, the same way I envied Proenneke. Guide Dom Gawel, who is in his mid-20s,\u00a0 was the quieter of the two, and he led a few of us on some longer hikes while others stayed behind at camp. Later, I asked Dom about loneliness. He thought young men feel lost today \u201cbecause they are comparing themselves to others in a negative way through social media\u201d and \u201cdisconnected from nature.\u201d<\/p>\n

Luckily, there\u2019s nothing close to a signal at Lake Clark National Park, no texts you feel compelled to answer, no influencers to interact with. That\u2019s not easy to do in the United States.<\/p>\n

I also found kinship with Dr. Adam Bolour, my kayak partner at Twin Lakes and roommate at Port Alsworth, a tiny Alaskan village on Lake Clark where we slept on our final night. We talked about fatherhood, relationships, and nature. He was traveling solo too, from California, and while he was upbeat and talkative with everyone, I watched him steal away to read some Ralph Waldo Emerson\u2019s Self-Reliance<\/i> by the lakeshore. I did the same with Proenekke\u2019s book there.<\/p>\n

I emailed to ask about male loneliness, when I got back to New Jersey.<\/p>\n

\u201cI cherish solo trips, whether I\u2019m married, feeling alone, feeling super connected with someone or a big group,\u201d he wrote. \u201cIt\u2019s just great to get away and convene with silence and space.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Lake
Arriving by float plane to Lake Clark National Park and Preserve.<\/span> (Photo: Getty)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

My revelations in Colorado and, later, at Proenneke\u2019s cabin, helped me realize I must connect deeply with myself in the outdoors from time to time. Nature can\u2019t just be an emergency room for me, either. It\u2019s long-term maintenance for my physical and mental health, whether it\u2019s trail running, floating in a swimming hole, or staring at mountains. It\u2019s more than a hobby. The version of me who returns from those trips is a better father and, hopefully, a better partner someday.<\/p>\n

Unlike Matthiessen, who spent months away from his young, grieving son in search of a snow leopard, or Proenneke, who spent 30 years away from almost everyone, I couldn\u2019t and wouldn\u2019t want to pull myself away from my children and responsibilities to that extreme. I have been guilty of that in the past. I\u2019ll make do with a vow to see mountains like the San Juans as much as possible, even if it\u2019s just a few days to convene with solitude, as Adam does. And if I can\u2019t get to the Sawtooths or Switzerland, I\u2019ll cut myself a break and keep exploring Pennsylvania or the Catskills.<\/p>\n

A few months after I got back from Alaska, I tackled Pennsylvania\u2019s Black Forest Trail. It\u2019s the state\u2019s most difficult hike, a 43-mile loop with a mind-boggling 8,500 feet of elevation gain. I was craving solitude, again, and found the trail emptier than the Alaskan backcountry. I saw as many rattlesnakes as people on that trip.<\/p>\n

On my final night of the hike, after pushing hard for about 18 miles, I took off my boots and socks and stretched out on a shady vista as the sun began to sink.\u00a0 Two hikers came in, a father and son, after their own long day. They hoped to camp there too and asked if I minded. I said it was fine and then, a few minutes later, reached for my socks and boots.<\/p>\n

I shouldered my heavy pack, wished them a deep sleep, and pushed on to find solitude, that little bit of loneliness all the world says is a problem.<\/p>\n\n

Jason Nark is a reporter who covers the outdoors for the <\/em>Philadelphia Inquirer and and a freelance writer whose work has appeared\u00a0in <\/em>The New York Times, <\/em>Outside, <\/em>The Alpinist, <\/em>Adventure Journal, <\/em>National Geographic, <\/em>Dwell, and other outlets.<\/em><\/p>\n


\n
Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Published July 9, 2026 03:00AM On the longest solo trip of my life, I stepped off a two-seat float plane onto the rocky shore of Upper Twin Lake in Alaska\u2019s Lake Clark National Park. I had taken four flights from New Jersey to Alaska to write about the iconic cabin handbuilt by Richard \u201cDick\u201d Proenneke,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15464,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15463","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wild-living"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15463","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15463"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15463\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/15464"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15463"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15463"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15463"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}