I came across something that says Sparrow wallet can connect directly to your node… This whole time I was thinking a middle man like Fulcrum electrs or electrumx were required to provide that connection. Since Fulcrum is taking what appears to be it’s sweet friggin time syncing, I was thinkin should I just get Tor instead? Won’t that give me an onion address for private transactions with my sparrow wallet/node setup or does it not work if not provided directly by one of those other services?
You can absolutely connect your Sparrow wallet directly to your Bitcoin node without using Fulcrum or Electrs. There are definite advantages to using an indexer like Fulcrum instead of connecting directly. I suggest reading Sparrow’s Best Practices Guide that discusses these options.
If you’re wondering which indexer to use, take a look at Sparrow’s research on why Fulcrum.