"Alone Again" by Gilbert O'Sullivan played on the radio when I was in my Tie Dye Days in 1972 at age 15. I remember being in the backyard of our house on Braemar Drive using multiple Rit colors to transform t-shirts into rainbows separated by jagged white rubberbanded lines. Tie Dying was so popular that oftentimes Lewis would be sold out of the brightest most brilliant colors.
I didn't really listen or think of the words to Alone Again and the meaning of the thoughts O'Sullivan was expressing in the song until a particular summer day outside when I stopped and stood still to hear and make myself think about and remember the lyrics. I did feel alone myself, but not in an especially bad way.
By the time I was 15 I was an 'only child'. My oldest brother was 24 and living in Denver, my other brother seven years my senior was long gone and living on his own. My sister, at nineteen was off in Colorado working as a construction flag girl for a road crew. I was alone really from age 14 on, but I felt alone long before this. From about age 11 on, I would take our dog for long long walks every day after school. The feeling of Alone does not always equate to being lonely but I think that is if you have a choice in the matter.
I have been feeling the distinct discomfort of alone-ness the past few weeks. Health issues magnify the fact that we all need someone who can take charge when we need them to. I am no Grizzly Adams surviving in the wilderness nor do I want to be. I have been again thinking and rethinking my next move. I have so many doubts and wonder when I will ever feel secure again. Insecurity is an exasperating feeling for me. I don't like it. It turns what should be a ho hum existence into a nail biting anxiety attack for me. Owning a home is no longer pleasurable to me. I stress out about what will break down next and know that I have no one who can just fix everything. I cannot complete even general maintenance on things that my husband used to do in minutes at my bequest. I set aside a small amount in savings each month for emergencies like a new air conditioner and a new water heater, but know I still lack enough money to fix multiple problems if they come all at one time.
I need to hire someone to fix the backyard deck under the pergola. I finally steeled myself to call some guys out of the paper. One wanted to charge more than the entire pergola and deck cost in materials, paint and labor!
I've got to make this house easier to sell by tiling the bathrooms and laundry, so I shopped for tile at Lowes today. I have the advantage of knowing what I want and knowing what I need. Buying decisions are easy, but yet so hard to know if I should be spending any money at all on this house. I want my better half to consult with!
When I do sell this house, I still don't know where I will go. Worse still, I still have not figured out how to even get to the point of knowing what the right thing to do is.
Last week I went to a free showing of the movie "Labor Day" presented by AARP. It was shown all over the U.S. to AARP members. I drove the 30+ miles to Scottsdale to stand in line waiting to get in. There were many other single women among the usual couples while we waited in the theatre for the show to start. Everyone but me had someone to talk to. So I sat and listened. I didn't have to strain to hear the women conversing next to me about what they were doing and what they wanted to do. One was especially candid with her friend about what she wished for and felt she was missing. She had apparently at one time moved to Phoenix from Omaha and still knew a man from outside Omaha. She talked about how she wished for a male companion: someone to hug and hold and kiss and be intimate with.(Yes, she actually said this!) Yet, she didn't necessarily want to be married again, and she didn't want to give up her beautiful condo and move back to Omaha where it was -6 degrees. I thought, wow she is really being frank with this friend.
I had never put my thoughts into words like this woman did, yet all these same thoughts float in and out of my head all the time. I get lonely. I feel trapped in this life now. I don't like where I am and I don't like the thought of moving either. I hate that I can't do the things I took for granted before. There are rules that if you are part of a couple you may not realize. First and foremost of the rules: I can't go out to eat (alone). I can't go to happy hour for a drink and half price appetizers (alone).
I did go to the movie alone and justified it because it was free, but the act of driving there alone, walking in alone and walking to the car afterwards alone were not enjoyable because it was not by choice that I am alone. I wonder if I had been divorced if I would feel differently. I can only guess, but my impression is that many divorced women have some sense of freedom or power as they strike out alone because they left their ex and the marriage, rather than the marriage dying with their husband.
Selfish as it is, I still think I would prefer to be divorced instead of widowed.
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