[acb-hsp] Why I Love Being Alone

[peter altschul]

Why I Love Being Alone
  September 3, 2012
  Until I left for college when I was 17, I had this weird 
tendency to look out the window of my bedroom at the parking lot 
of the movie store across the street from our house, to see if 
the store was closed yet.  Of course, it closed at the same time 
every night.  I liked seeing the lights on, the people walking in 
from their cars, imagining them walking around inside, smelling 
the greasy popcorn popped in a machine in the store, picking a 
movie, maybe quickly, maybe after a long debate.  I loved the 
idea of people moving around in the world outside, especially 
when things inside felt desperate and awful.  As long as there 
was movement, I was not alone.
  So far in life, I've had a strange relationship with aloneness.  
Even as a kid, I was more likely to choose being by myself over 
spending time with other people.  (The exception was high school, 
when I completely believed that not having plans on Friday and/or 
Saturday made you an aberration.) Now, in my 30's, aloneness is 
something I crave like food.  I need to be alone a lot, in ways 
that are complicated and bewildering, I think, to some of the 
people around me.
  I am good at being alone, it's one of the things I like most 
about myself.  I'm proud of it.  Knowing that aloneness is 
something I'm not only comfortable with, but crave, has meant 
that I seem to need less of it.  As long as I can close a door, 
or walk away, or sit by myself, I'm fine.  Being alone makes me 
feel powerful and peaceful.  It makes me feel like my brain is a 
gold mine, and I'm so lucky to have this imagination.  Being 
alone has always felt deeply indulgent to me, like a day off or 
being able to buy whatever you want.  I can subsume the need, of 
course, if I have to, and there's a part of me that thrives on 
crowds and bustle and ambient noise.  Too much, though, and I get 
cranky and sad and thoroughly unpleasant.
  I am a person who needs a lot of space, not the physical sort, 
but the distance from others kind.  I'm pretty sure I can't go on 
vacation with someone because I'd be grouchy if I couldn't spend 
at least 60% of the time alone, wandering the streets or reading.  
This is something I'm pretty sure (very sure, actually) that a 
few people in my life find this disarming-because eventually 
you're supposed to stop being by yourself and find someone to be 
with instead.  You stop being a solitary creature with your own 
space and start building a space with someone else.  And then you 
add more people to that space.  You should do this for a lot of 
reasons, but al...y don't REALLY want to be alone, right?
  We have bought this, I think, the idea that being alone is 
something we should avoid at all costs.  Women who are alone, who 
live alone after a certain age, who aren't partnered, are 
pathetic and deeply suspicious.  Men who are alone are either 
oversexed, perpetual teenagers, sad, asexual creatures, or creepy 
perverts.  Being by yourself is not a choice anyone in their 
right mind is supposed to opt for.
  Charles Bukowski wrote, "Loneliness is something I've never 
been bothered with because I've always had this terrible itch for 
solitude." It's important to know the difference between being 
alone and being lonely, and they're often confused.  For me, 
being alone is something I choose, loneliness is the result of 
being alone, or feeling alone when I haven't chosen it, but they 
aren't the same, and they don't necessarily lead to one another.
  It's assumed that if you are alone, you must be lonely, or 
there must be something wrong, especially in a culture in which 
we emphasize the heterosexual couple as the symbol of the 
ultimate satisfaction.  Spending time alone is another method of 
developing a relationship with myself, of actively engaging with 
what I want and what the possibilities could be.  It's a loss, I 
think, that being alone has become something else that we police 
socially, because the result is that we miss out on an important 
part of what it means to live in our bodies.