Further Reflections on 'Being Alone'

I’ve become more and more interested recently in thinking and writing about solitude, about being and spending time alone and about the relationship between this and loneliness and isolation. It all started with the focus of others on the need not ‘to be alone’, not to ‘be on my own’. I’ve wondered what it really means when people say such things. A week or two ago I heard of a friend of a friend who said to his ex ‘I won’t be happy again until I have someone to share my life with’.  I’ve written (many times before) about my status and experience as a childless woman, widowed, no siblings with parents both dead (most recently at  On Being ‘Alone’ | ABCtales and ‘I’d have thought you’d be over that by now.' | ABCtales). From these writings, and others, what I hope is clear is that although I sometimes feel stigmatised and excluded by both my nonmother and non-partnered identity, being without children is something that still brings me sadness whilst being without a current ‘life-partner’ does not cause me any distress. I miss, oh so very much, my loved ones who have died; my parents Ron and Dorothy and my husband John, my unborn child. But, not only did they leave me with enough love to last a lifetime they all (in their various ways) empowered me to value my opportunities and abilities and to be comfortable in, and with, my-self.

Although I live alone I do not feel as if I’m on my own. I spend quite a bit of time working, and in leisure, in my own company but I ‘share my life’ both outside my home and inside (not least via zoom, DUO and all the rest) sharing thoughts, feelings, laughter, food and more with others. I’m left struggling with why so many people seem so uncomfortable, so unhappy, in their own company, with their own thoughts. And why is the answer to this most often assumed to be a new/different partner? What is this obsession with ‘togetherness’ as in romantic togetherness? Why the focus on sexual and domestic partnership in a way that suggests a hierarchy of connections, of relationships, of networks? I do not mean to deny the experience of others. I know that loneliness can impact very severely on physical and mental health, leading to increased and multiple co-morbidities and even premature death and that this has increased during the pandemic. I know too that many  people (e.g. some older people and those housebound by illness or disability) who live alone experience loneliness if they do not have the opportunities to be with others in the way that I do. I appreciate that my feelings on the issue are influenced by a position of privilege But I know too that solitude (which is different from isolation and loneliness) can be a positive and not a negative experience with freedom, creativity, intimacy, and spirituality all identified as benefits of solitude. Again I acknowledge difference here in that such positives are less likely for those who, for example, are homeless or living in situations of material discomfort and insecurity .

Of course (even for me, and as I’ve noted before On Being ‘Alone’ | ABCtales) there are ambivalences. There are jobs that don’t get done because I don’t have the skill or the inclination or I’m just fed up with having to always take the responsibility for the organising of getting someone in. So the damp patch in the corner of the living room and the whistle that accompanies every four/five flushes of the loo is my problem (I’m living with both at the moment and have been for a while) and my problem alone. Then there are the times when I’d really like some else to make a drink or cook a meal or order a takeaway or change the bed…. and all the rest. I recognise too that when living with another or others, when sharing one’s living space, this does not necessarily mean that responsibilities are shared, that relationships are equal; which takes me back to my concerns on the view that the only way to be complete as an individual is to share one’s life (intimately) with another. Curious.

Looking back at my first Covid-19 lockdown experience I accept that this was the time that I came closest to being lonely, but still not quite. Although I was glad when ‘social bubbles’ were allowed I was never without (online) company during the spring and early summer of 2020. Like many others I missed the tactile affection of friends and the daily encounters and communications with acquaintances, but even so during my time in ‘isolation’ I was mostly happy about being on my own. For a while I didn’t go out at all, not even to walk. Rather I worked, cooked, communicated with friends, watched Netflix and the news. Not for me, nor for many of us, any elicit cake fuelled parties or curries with colleagues! The news was upsetting of course. The suffering of those who were ill and those left bereaved, the hypocrisy of the ‘claps for key workers’ whilst nurses used bin bags for PPE, and the stories of isolation and loneliness (which I had much sympathy with but, as I say, didn’t really share).

It was, I know, living through these few months that have led to my thoughts about and interest in ‘aloneness’ and what it might and might not mean to those who experience it. In addition to memoir I’ve written a couple of stories about the issue too. It feels like something about which I have more to say. Overall, as must be clear by now, I believe that is essential to look beyond stereotypical and societal expectations of the way we should live our lives. But (isn’t there always a but) at the same time it is always important, I very strongly believe, to be aware that our own understandings and feelings of an experience are just that; our own. So whilst I want people to understand and appreciate how I feel, I hope I can always understand and appreciate that others in the same situation will feel differently. Furthermore, whilst challenging meanings and understandings as I am, it is important to, as noted above, always be aware of difference.

Recently at the Centre for Death and Society (CDAS) annual conference Centre for Death & Society (bath.ac.uk)I attended a writing workshop led by Amy Shea Projects – Amy Shea (amysshea.com) During the session we read a blog written by a man who whilst an inmate of San Quentin State Prison (California) contracted Covid, along with 75% of the prison’s population. As a result he was placed in solitary confinement, in a room ‘not legally big enough for a dog’ for 60 days.

As I say, any discussion of this often over-simplified but complex experience must include reference to and acknowledgment of privilege.