Alone

I have forgotten how much I don't like being alone.  I realized this acutely this weekend.

Back, when Robbie was just three, I started a journey of independence, and the education of how to be 'alone'. Every Sunday I would start a week without him, and while there was work and home, there were meals, down time and hours to fill that didn't include anyone but me.  I joined activities, I made friends who were in the same boat and I adapted to an independent life style. I started to enjoy solitude for what it was, and I not only survived those years, I grew and developed into the person I am today.

There was one thing that I never adapted to.  Dinner.  I would come home at the end of the day, maybe (if I was alone) hit the gym, take a walk, work out in Karate, but never, dinner.  It has become a joke that I believe Popcorn is a balanced meal, but most nights of the week, that is exactly what I did...I ate popcorn.  Usually reading a book, and if Robbie was there, he would read by my side.  Looking at the 6 foot 4 frame of Robbie today, it is hard to realize that about 2 feet of that was built on popcorn.

Ron traveled this week and I patched together enough food to keep Hannah from starving, but I didn't make dinner.  I can cook.  It is a skill I was taught early in life.  It isn't about the inability to actually put food on the table.  It goes deeper than that.

When I am alone, I feel, lonely.  I don't like that feeling, and the uncomfortable pit that sits in my stomach, replacing what would normally be a 'meal'.

This weekend Ron took Hannah out of town and it was just me, alone.  I did some work, I put away laundry, I sent out a couple overdue emails, did some banking, went to the gym, but mostly I had too much time to myself.  I kept thinking, I need to be 'doing' something.  I felt, distinctly, alone.  That I was somehow being punished.

Those times, back when Robbie was little, and I was raising him, trying to find my young way in the world, worried about making ends meet, my job, my future,...I hurt.  I hurt a lot. I was genuinely alone.  But I survived, and ultimately, I believe, thrived and gained, the knowledge (if not the desire) to be able to live on my own, if ever the occasion arose.

I realized today, that just because I am physically alone, doesn't mean that I will ever be as alone as I was back then, but, I also realized, that there are still scars and I need to learn, at some point, how to have dinner, alone. Once I accomplish that goal, I may be able to start facing that fear, and overcome the prevailing sense of loneliness that overtakes me time and time again.