connections................

      By being truly alone I had seen how deeply reliant I am on human ties and in ways that were unexpected.  It was not simply a matter of having company to pass the time, or backup in case of emergency.  During the expedition, I found that the absence of others had shaped my behaviour, my thoughts, my actions, my reasoning.  I had seen for myself that it is human relationships that bind us to places, time, and purpose, human relationships that make us who we are as individuals and that our contentment, and our happiness, depend on those precious human connections.

-Felicity Aston, Alone In Antarctica