Tag: loneliness

The Guest House

Read the book for the fascinating details. After outlining the source of systemic loneliness, Wilson asserts we need to be alone and connect with nature..

My view of the pines.

My she-shed

The studio apartment is designed simply with muted whites and browns. I enter the guest house on my nephew’s property and experience immediate relief.

“Why are you here?” asks my four-year-old great-niece who is looking forward to her vacation in Hawaii.

“To write the great American novel,” I reply, because I don’t know how to explain to her that I need space.

Why do I need space?

 I don’t know. But I love the guest house which my nephew and niece open to me when they leave town.

The childhood noise that permeated our house when we first moved in together is subdued now. The boys remain out of sight most often.

Only one is surly at dinner. And not every dinner.

COVID eliminated our exuberant social gatherings.

Coincidentally, I rediscovered the book by Sarah Wilson which speaks to loneliness. I am not unique. Wilson presents the disturbing numbers showing that the world is suffering from loneliness.

. . .loneliness didn’t exist as a word or concept in our culture until the 19th century. It is not a coincidence . . .

This One Wild and Precious Life: The Path Back to Connection in a Fractured World by Sarah Wilson,
quoting historian Fay Bound Alberti
A Biography of Loneliness

No spoiler here.

Read the book for the fascinating details. After outlining the source of systemic loneliness, Wilson asserts we need to be alone and connect with nature.

I write this from a deck among the pines near Flagstaff, AZ. It is partly cloudy in Illinois terms, cloudy in Arizona. There are great patches of blue allowing the sunlight through. Rain is expected, a great relief to this drought-stricken area.

And I do not feel lonely.

Practicing aloneness

It is easy to live with aloneness. I haven’t mastered loneliness.

Alone but not lonely

I have been alone this week. But not lonely. Well, no lonelier than when I am at home in a house filled with people.

I enjoy the calm of a studio guest house. The elegant house occupied by my nephew and his family sits across the brick paved drive, silent while they are in Hawaii. This is my experiment with living with and by myself.

My haven

Never in my life have I not shared living space. Never had a bedroom of my own. My sister and I were far enough separated by age and temperament to allow me personal space at a desk.

My first desk was a child-size roll-top, purchased second-hand from a neighbor for my 13th birthday. It would be juvenile for the 13-year-olds of today. But I was ecstatic.

I sat at that desk away from the chaos of a full house to complete homework, to write in a journal, to log. . .what? Maybe grades? I loved organizing the cubbies and the drawers. It was my space.

I now sit at the desk in this quiet studio and write. The only sound is the steady breath of the air conditioner. At this moment I am not lonely. I am aware that aloneness is a physical state; loneliness is emotional.

It is easy to live with aloneness. I haven’t mastered loneliness.