John Pepin, Michigan Department of Natural Resources

In the darkness of the room, I could see things I wouldn’t have spotted with the lights on. Components of the old heater, for example.

I’d still have been able to hear it clicking and ticking as it heated up and cooled down, but I wouldn’t have been able to see the faded, red-orange electric glow of the neatly aligned heat coiling in the lower part of the unit.

However, in the blackness here, the warming, red glow makes me feel warmer just looking at it.

It’s a psychological response, like when I am outdoors and it’s below zero and I tell myself that I am warm. I seem to immediately feel less of the biting cold on my face or throughout my body — straight down to the bone.

Once the light goes out in the room, the blackness is at its darkest. As time passes, outlines of things begin to appear faintly.

Pale, blue-white light from outside oozes in through the window glass and slides down the wall beneath the lower reaches of the curtains to the floor.

It moves slow, kind of like shampoo poured from a bottle. I can almost smell it. I think it’s strawberry.

As a few more minutes fade past, I can now see an outline of the old rocking chair in the corner, bathed in the warming glow from the heater.

There is another psychological response I find in darkened rooms. The blackness fills up the entire room and leaves no space at all to feel alone.

For me, it’s almost like being covered in a big, thick sleeping bag that’s been unzipped and spread out like a blanket. I close my eyes to enhance the experience.

My sense of hearing is amplified, not only to hearing things within the room, but also without. A car slipping by out there on a rain-slicked highway can sound almost as loud as if I was standing right out there as it went past.

I can feel the cold, wet splashing spray hit me across my right side from shin to shoulder. I can always hear the whistle from a passing train from miles away or a barred owl, singing off in a woodlot down by the lake.

The darkness can also bring a satisfying feeling of relaxation, a calming sensation that whatever had to be done that day or even the next is of no concern right now.

If for no other reason, this is certainly one reason I try to slip as deeply as I can into the darkness gathered around me in this room or any other.

I don’t want there to be intrusions or interruptions as I try to imbue myself with this thick, black-blue ink, seeping into my skin and my heart, mind and soul.

Sinking farther down into the comforts of this oasis bring a sublime peacefulness that makes me wonder if this is what it will be like when I die.

I wonder if the turning off of the senses happens immediately, or do we lose those abilities in a dimming, gradual sense?

I know I would love to spend a full day or a few confined to a dark, welcoming room, but I don’t know about an eternity.

Of course, it could all be wrong. There may be no darkness whatsoever, only light. That also seems like a strange way to spend eternity, at least compared to the human earthly experience.

I’ve always enjoyed the time I’ve been able to spend in a cabin or a guest house like this, able to take advantage of these quiet amenities — to slow myself down to a trickle to see what molasses feels like.

I think the relaxation of the experience likely slows my heart rate and my breathing too. I tend to sleep like a baby in these conditions — maybe even a baby rock.

If it also happens to be raining overnight, the white noise of the raindrops pattering on the roof makes my sleep even deeper.

Like a bear in hibernation, I don’t tend to eat a lot of food during these times, but I do spend the daytime hours busy. I usually am working on some type of writing, observing or thinking, thinking, thinking.

Sometimes, there will be a guitar with me. Others, only a pen and paper. Either way, I become a sponge, opening myself up to whatever the cosmos will provide.

I wait, like Morse or Marconi, for a distant message to arrive.

I’m ready to jot it down. Sometimes, it comes before I’m even ready to start receiving. Other times, it doesn’t come at all. Either way, the quiet is constructive and conducive to artistic endeavors.

Even the sound of a single human voice, however faint or well-intentioned, can sound like the ocean roaring in my ears. This is especially true the longer the seclusion encounter continues.

When I first arrive, I am clumsy and aloof, like I don’t what I am supposed to do while I’m here. My senses are snapping at stimuli all over the place, but I am focused on nothing tangible.

In short, I feel lost, disconnected and out of touch or reach, uncertain of what to do or where to go. I am then the proverbial stranger in a strange land.

Thankfully, this disorienting feeling usually wears off quickly with the softness of breezes found when leaning off the cabin porch rail or in the sounds of birds communicating their own messages to each other – back and forth, over the hills and the riverbanks.

There is no such welcoming or moderated adjustment or wearing-off of time spent alone in nature or dark cabins, retreats or reflective journeys under the stars.

The way back to society is usually jarring, quick, sudden and unforgiving.

I am usually reintroduced to my usual environs with sounds of blaring car horns or people talking overly loud about nonsense, drivers swerving or lagging, competing for the most advantageous lane position as they see it on everything from county roads to interstate highways.

Telephones ringing, beepers, buzzers, dingers, clangers and chimes of all kinds sending constant alerts as though the world was spontaneously combusting at this very moment, and everyone needs to don their silvery baked potato fire shelters now to stand any chance of surviving whatsoever.

But that’s the worst part of all this, there is most often no emergency of any kind whatsoever. When I ask what that beeping noise is or the constant buzzing sound, answers I receive are typically things like, “The soup’s done.”

All that for the soup? It must be some soup!

So, by design, my opportunities for seclusion, reflection and relaxation seldom include cellphones or other noisemaking things whose alarms and alerts don’t often live up to their presumed usefulness.

I remember when I was a newspaper reporter years ago, I was told we were all getting new pagers to update previous models we had been issued. I asked if that meant I had to retrieve my old one from the bottom of the lake.

I am constantly in search of new sights, sounds, feelings and experiences that will keep me occupied for untold lengths of time away from the bustling, the hustling and the traps and B.S. of societal interactions and demands.

There are higher pursuits. It’s a choice. For me, it’s an easy one.

With the rising sun, I awake energized after my good night’s sleep. If the sun is out, I am not usually far behind, chasing it all the way to sundown.

If it’s raining, I might pick up my fishing pole or a book or my pad and pen. I might also slide the blackout blinds across the curtain rod or pull slip a sleep blindfold over my eyes and roll the blankets around me for another hour or so of sleep.

That’s another fascination with a secluded cabin stay, the unlikelihood of encountering other people. Especially during the work week, it’s easy to imagine folks rushing back to their jobs and demands while I am instead happily enveloped here in peacefulness.

That’s a very fine feeling I can wholeheartedly recommend.

With the number of clicking noises that old heating unit has been making, I am convinced that it’s a cold night out there tonight.

That reminds me of yet another psychological effect of a stay in a dark cabin. That’s the feelings of being safe or protected while storms, cold, heat, rain, snow or winds are actively wailing out there beyond the cold and brittle panes of window glass.

So here I am in my temporary palace. There are numerous friends here with me who make their appearances to me through their writings, drawings, music or art.

With these influences, I fold in my memories, thoughts, dreams, hopes and aspirations as I work to create things new and strange or familiar and satisfying.

There are chilly winds tonight as I close the cabin door and lock it, producing more impressions of safety, warmth and satisfaction.

Wrapped deeply in my seclusion, I seek to find, to create, to master and produce, to catch some stardust in my shirt pocket or to dream away a blue and gray workday afternoon.

Gathering the darkness to me like an old friend, I already sense that I will need to return home soon, but for now, I will remain here alone and alive — so very much alive.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Outdoors North is a weekly column produced by the Michigan Department of Natural Resources on a wide range of topics important to those who enjoy and appreciate Michigan’s world-class natural resources of the Upper Peninsula.