I listened to David Nicholson on Sara and Cariad’s Weirdo’s Bookclub talking about loneliness, and how being lonely is different from missing someone. I have thought about loneliness so often, since being on my own for six years since my marriage ended - tried to combat it by telling myself repeatedly that I am enough.
Being alone is not the same as being lonely, and although there were times when I felt the weight of being the only adult in a house with four young daughters, I found a way to manage the alone-ness. To be honest, it was a relief not to have to manage someone else’s emotions. I used the time to try to reclaim myself, write myself back onto the page, both metaphorically and literally.
I have been surprised and occasionally overwhelmed by the effects of falling in love after years of keeping myself coiled up and defensive. I understand now that I have subconsciously refused to allow myself to think about how different life could be if I opened myself up to another person. The act of letting someone in to my life, experiencing intense love, is terrifying, and it has the disarming effect of highlighting what has been missing.
The other night, I stood and stared up at the full moon, just as I have done so many times before. When I did this in the past I felt less alone - I partly wrote Twelve Moons in order to explore my feelings around identity and what it means to be a single woman. The other night though, I could feel him behind me, almost but not quite touching me, but in some ways I felt more alone, because I was imagining the hole he would leave if he wasn’t there. The fear of being alone again was real, more acute than the long term isolation that preceded this surprising new life, because now I know what it is to be loved.
Being occasionally lonely was sometimes sad - if it was a colour it was grey or a muddy blue. Missing someone, that ache you get in your chest when you are not with them, is more like deep crimson or violent burgundy. I am scared by these fierce feelings but I’d rather experience a wild technicolour existence than a subdued one in the shadows…
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✨❤️🩹🪡✨
I feel this in my bones!!!