Another instructor at school told me that yet another instructor lived in my neighborhood. So when I saw him at school last week I asked him about it. Yes, he has been living up the road for two years and I didn’t even know it. He and his wife bought the house next door to Yoko (my piano buddy). So I told him he really missed out, I live on the lake side of the road with a dock and boats and great swimming. The other instructor with him was laughing but I think I upset my neighbor. He said they moved out here to get away. (But he was interested in possibly car pooling, if our schedules can coordinate.)
Then I start thinking about what it means to “get away.” I’m not exactly an invasive neighbor. If anything I am alone far too much. I did not move out here to get away. I moved here because it is so beautiful, peaceful and I love the closeness to nature (bears, deer, slugs, ants included). I would like more people to visit, more people to experience the beauty here. I work alone by necessity. (It would be difficult to paint with an audience.) Most of my (social) life is in Halifax, a twenty-five minute drive (on good days, i.e., no snowstorm). Other people out here with children have a busy life with their neighbors.
In The Dive from Clausen’s Pier, Carrie asks her mother (who never remarried, much less dated, after her husband left) about loneliness: “Lonely is a funny thing,” (her mother) said slowly. “It’s almost like another person. After a while, it’ll keep you company if you’ll let it.” Loneliness can be palpable, almost solid. A sometimes interesting, sometimes irritating, unwanted friend. Everyone relates differently to loneliness. Keeping busy or pulling back, avoiding or not. Sometimes I just sit in my living room and “feel” lonely, get to know it better. It is often hard to move out of that lonely state of mind. To call someone, make plans, move into a social state. I find it easiest to have last minute events, unexpected visitors, unplanned dinner parties, all easier than setting up dates when things feel so fluid all the time.
I once asked a Buddhist teacher about loneliness. He asked me when I felt it worse, with other people or alone. He said when it feels more lonely with people it is self-indulgence. That’s a lot to think about. So maybe it is okay to be lonely when you are alone. It’s just part of being human, a social being.