filed in Myths and stereotypes
Table for One Isn’t Lonely in My Home
Today in the health section of the New York Times, there’s an article about the epidemic of loneliness and it’s impact on health. To be honest, I couldn’t get through the article. I found it too depressing – and not because I could relate to it, but because I couldn’t. The illustration above, which accompanied the piece is so grim. In my home, dining alone is a joyous experience. I cook myself beautiful food, and take the time to savor it. I sip a vodka martini in a frosty class, with Rose snuggled nearby in her dog bed. I feel complete.
Illustration by Jon Krause
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23 comments for “Table for One Isn’t Lonely in My Home”
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I think the article is valid. Loneliness is relatively new to the human experience and deserves to be studied. I thrive off of being alone. I’m guessing that you do too. However, when I crave company, a little blinker starts flashing in my brain to prompt me to make plans and seek out others. Some people may lack that self awareness until it’s too late. You have also said that you always make sure to have holiday plans in place well in advance. You know yourself well enough to be insulated from the effects of loneliness. But some people depend on others to satisfy this need for them and it can be very disorienting when they lose a life partner. Their health usually deteriorates not too long after the loss…unless they have the coping skills to deal with it. A hot line for lonely seniors could achieve that. One of my relatives was widowed a couple of years ago after a 60 year marriage. It was like being a newborn baby again. She knew nothing. She didn’t even know how to write a check. Her husband earned the money and took care of all of the bills. Her health declined very quickly. American culture also turns it’s back on seniors and they don’t live under the same roofs as their families like they would in other cultures. That might also contribute to loneliness and an early demise. That doesn’t apply to you because you already have built in mechanisms for staving off loneliness, but people who depended too much on their families and then face the shock of being alone do not.
Thanks for your thoughtful comment, Leyla. I read the beginning of the article, combined with the photo and I got frustrated.
I think one problem with the article is that it doesn’t make a distinction between solitude and loneliness, nor make the point that some people are capable of being alone and not being lonely.
I loved Alec Baldwin’s recent interview with the writer Iris Smyles on his podcast “Here’s the Thing”. She loves going to the movies alone, and prefers living “in a cave, like a monk” to an active social life.
I think that some people are fine, and perhaps better off, spending large portions of time alone. I LOVE it–am perfectly able to find tons of enjoyable things to do when I am by myself.
Although it is true that the loss of a spouse can pose a serious challenge. My Grandma, at the ripe old age of 94, lost her husband, and until that point had never lived alone in her life!
My parents had been happily married for 46 years when my Mom died. About 6 months later, I had a conversation with my father about the joys of being single, and he looked at me like I was crazy. All he had known as an adult was being in a couple.
My parents have had a long unhappy marriage filled with spite and cruelty. I’ve been praying since I was 5 years old that they would divorce, but they are too co-dependent. Despite all of this and his frequent complaints that getting married is the worst decision he has ever made, my dad STILL looks at me like I’m crazy when I express doubts about getting married. He lumps lifelong single people into this category of being universally miserable and unfulfilled. This just shows you how ludicrous the obsession with marriage is. Even some people who hate their marriages think it’s better than being on their own. Thank god I have the ability to function solo because I know what the consequences could be if I desperately needed someone. The fighting between my mom and dad has been relentless every single day for over 25 years.
I’m sorry to hear about your parents’ marriage. That must have been hard to witness. And it must be maddening as well that your Dad is such a staunch defender of the institution.
I haven’t read the article, because, while for the most part I enjoy my solitude, I do sometimes feel lonely and I am tired of reading about how this is going to result in me a) getting dementia b) dying early c) etc.!
I believe that feeling lonely sometimes is part of the human condition. I also think that seniors are increasingly isolated and ignored – it’s not rocket science to know this isn’t a healthy state of affairs. I’d also like to point out that there are PLENTY of people who have a spouse who lives with them and they still experience terrible loneliness.
Izzybell, good point about the loneliness that many married people feel.
One of my favorite quotes is from Chekhov – “If you’re afraid of loneliness, don’t marry.”
I read the article (and many of the comments) and there is not distinction made between “lonely” and “alone” (kind of hard to separate mice into those categories 😉 ) I did not find this article depressing at all; in fact, it made me thankful that I not only enjoy my solitude (and a well cooked meal plus libation is indeed a fine thing), but that I am also grateful to have friends.
However, were those friends to disappear from my life I’m positive I’d feel lonely too. Perhaps not all the time, because I do enjoy my own company, but certainly at least some of the time.
A hotline is a wonderful idea, but I would probably want face-to-face interaction as well.
The illustration is certainly bleak, though.
Also, here’s a favorite comment from Dale in NJ:
“Yes, loneliness is a problem, but I often see the reverse problem as well. There are many people just petrified to spend any time alone with just their thoughts in quiet contemplation. They have to be constantly around other people, music playing, talking nonsense on their smartphone, etc. I can’t tell you how many people look at me and think I should be committed when I actually say I often enjoy going to dinner alone or seeing a movie by myself. …..or ….shhhhh…don’t tell anyone….maybe even taking a mini vacation by myself.”
Petra, again–savoring a coffee or tea or cocktail while alone with a cookbook (or three) brings me such contentment and joy. Oddly, I feel very connected to humanity during such times.
I’m grateful that being single has diversified my social portfolio. I’m not dependent on just one person.
The illustration is bleak. Though I like the artist’s work.
Yes, the illustration is bleak, but it is also part of the human experience, so I am open to it. I often do prepare dinner for one, and I often enjoy it, but not always. Let’s not allow this one illustration to define us, but let’s allow it into our consciousness as something that does happen. We don’t have to define it as good or bad, but people set a table for one and are allowed to have mixed feelings about it. I do understand your objections, believe me. Often a table set for five can be much more suffocating and bleaker than this appears to be, yet we don’t often see how depressed married people are.
When the Washington Post magazine did a Valentines story on being single, I landed on the cover with Rose. The article was very nuanced, but the cover photo was a long shot of the backs of me and Rose, and it looked kind of lonely. Images have power. If there was more balance by showing the loneliess of married life, I’d have fewer objections.
I read that Valentine’s article, I think it was about people who never found the one and “lived to tell about it.” Right? That’s how I learned about you and found this blog! I think there are more mommy blogs and married women blogs revealing the difficulties of married life now, they just haven’t entered the public consciousness as much. Among people my age, being single is quite fashionable and #foreveralone is a trend and a sub-culture in and of itself among millenials. Marriage is losing it’s appeal.
The statistics definitely bear that out, Leyla. Singles are demographically on the rise.
Wendy, I just re-read that article and the magazine feature and your poise and eloquence are so admirable. When reading the surveys that accompanied the piece, it struck me as odd that we need to ask people what their reason was for not getting married? Why do we need justification for NOT doing something? It’s why DID the chicken cross the road, not why *didn’t* the chicken cross the road. Don’t you need to justify action more than you need to justify inaction? If they released a survey about the real reasons why people got married or why they stayed married, the results would be really depressing, much more so than people perceived the article to be. Some responses from people I know personally would be:
* I got pregnant
* I needed the health insurance
* I would be too afraid to leave him
* We had been living together for 5 years, so marriage just seemed like the next step
* I felt that I was at the right age to get married, so I married the person I was with at the time, even if she didn’t feel like the one
Yet there’s supposedly something wrong with *us* for declining to put ourselves in these above positions. Society is really backwards.
I really believe that society is catching up!
For me loneliness is sometimes uncomfortable, sometimes painful, and other times it just is part of the multitude of emotions we humans have. I can be equally lonely with other people as on my own. I don’t think it’s something to fear. Rather it’s something to fathom, examine and learn from. Neither marriage or being single is a solution as loneliness is part of our existence.
Jules, in your description, is loneliness decoupled (so to speak) from whether you’re physically alone or with others?
Yes, Wendy. For me I can be equally lonely wether physically alone or with others.
We need a new word. (I think as the word is understood, lonely means without company.)