I would venture to say that one of the worst parts about feeling lonely is a secure knowledge that you are absolutely alone in the unique way that you feel alone. I am writing this to break that security. If nothing else, after reading this you can know that you are a little less alone because someone is, or has or will feel the way that you are right now. I think that little bit of solidarity is something substantial to hold onto.
-There's the loneliness you feel when you're a refugee and you no longer have a home to return to. You spend each day on unfamiliar ground surrounded by paranoia, longing for a place that doesn't exist anymore. You can't return to your house because its not safe or there is no house there any longer.
-When you're little and don't have many or possibly any friends. This leads to creating wonderful imaginary friends. But the creation of imaginary friends leads to later in life the wistful loneliness for those bygone imaginary friends. You sit wondering, "what did they look like? Were they nice or mean? What are they doing these days?"
-There's the loneliness that comes from all your friends moving away and you're the last one left in town. Do you set off as well or stick around and try to make the new situation work?
-Or on the other hand there's the opposite situation when you have a new career, or school or something else that takes you some place completely different from everyone you know. This means starting from scratch. It means finding new restaurants to go to, making new friends, finding things to do. It means missing all those people you left behind that you keep in your heart. It means calling them in the middle of the night, but hanging up before they answer because you don't want to seem needy.
- And then there's the loneliness that comes from a rainy day that words can't quite describe. It might be similar to the feeling of missing someone or something that you've never known.
-When you live alone and you burn yourself on the stove, but since you live in solitude there is no one to call you an idiot for burning yourself. So what do you do? You then admonish yourself for being dumb, you knew the stove was hot, you know what heat is, you're not four years old, how could you do this?
-When you are a crazy cat lady. Okay maybe you're arguing that you don't feel lonely at all because you've replaced all your friends with felines. And okay maybe you say you understand cats better than people, which really is understandable, people are crazy. But we both know you were more comfortable at 7-9 cats and now you're up to 15. There are literally cats on top of cats and where are Muffin and Jo-Jo? They've been missing for days now...
-When you're sick as an adult. There isn't anyone to take care of you if you stay home and no one to take pity on you when you're acting pitiful. Except for the most die-hard of firends, no one is going to want to spend time with you while you're sick. That means its just going to be you, a cup of tea, a bowl of soup and any sappy movie you choose since there's no one to veto it.
- The strong arrow of loneliness that strikes straight through the heart when a friend lets it slip that you missed an awesome outing. How dare they all hang out without you? Couldn't they have at least texted?
-The loneliness when you are half a gallon of milk that never got completely drank. You sit in the fridge in denial of your soon to be fate thinking, pleading, "No! Please! Don't pour me down the drain. I'm okay for consumption, I swear. Ignore the smell I'm alright!"
-There's the loneliness when you have a secret crush. You think that person is the coolest in the room/world, but who knows if they even know you're name. You sit each day, four desks away pining for that special someone and the way they wear their hair/skirt/tie/shoes or tell such good jokes or just that thing about them.
-The loneliness of sitting at a table of friends and realizing that after all this time you have nothing in common, or maybe you just feel inexplicably alone. Which is dumb right? To feel alone while surrounded by people, but there you are, lonely all the same.
And to almost all of these scenarios I say, pick up the phone call a friend. It just might turn your day around. Also here's a video that's a little more relevant than usual.
Doctor Dog
Lonesome
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