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Jane Merrow – acts and chats

Loneliness or Solitude?

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Currently I am sending some time in an enforced stay at home recovering from a bit of surgery.  All good. However the experiece gives one time to relax, apart from reading, watching too much television and just reflecting.  And – being alone.

Picture is from our film ANDY. Anne is lonely after Andy has gone.

An elderly woman sitting at a table with a tablecloth, looking contemplative while two lit candles illuminate the scene. A bowl of fruit, including apples and bananas, is in front of her.

I read and still read a lot about loneliness, now pronounced by some as the new disease.   Not sure about that.  Maybe and maybe for the middle aged who have grown up in a world full of noise and speed,  mostly living in materialistic Western world.  However along with all the benefits, comes the downside of finding ourselves isolated and potentially lonely.  AI is making it worse as our automony is being taken away from us.  (Once this piece is written I could turn it over to AI for “improvement”, but that would “improve” my thoughts.

Anyway I don’t believe we should angst too much about bring alone.  It enables us to know ourselves better, to open our eyes and look at the world around us, not be obsessed by the endless chatter and the doom and gloom of the media, designed to bring us back to the feeding bowl of their daily fodder.  A daily walk is good too, not just for health but to stay in touch with the world we live in.  

A smiling elderly woman and a man with glasses taking a selfie together in a warmly decorated room with a table covered in a cloth and a bowl of oranges in the background.

I like good company and friends as much as anyone – I love them and enjoy them.  But they are real friends, not just good acquaintances.   I had a very solitary life in a dysfunctional family until the age of thirteen, when I was trust into the ‘joys’ of boarding school.  It  brought bring me many new acquaintances, only a couple of good friends, but where I learned quickly how challenging life and human nature can be.   It took me a few more years and life experiences to learn more about human nature and that being alone is not all bad.  I don’t regret the experience.

I could go on and on about the events, upbringing etc make us more vulnerable to loneliness.  But even in the best of families, with a stable, secure  upbringing ( is there really the perfect family life?), you can still can find yourself alone, for whatever reason.  This is not to minimise some of the most appalling childhoods some have had and these thoughts of mine doesn’t include those.  That’s a whole other story, which doesn’t belong here.

Anne plays chess with Andy in the film ANDY

An elderly woman and a young man focus intently on a chess game at a cozy indoor setting, with a wooden chessboard between them.


So don’t take all these warnings about being alone too much is bad for us.  However if it is upsetting, then may I suggest my mother’s advice, join a bridge club, or learn to play chess.  Playing games like these are good not only for the relaxed companionship – no forced conversation – but also keep the brain engaged and working outside of  ” navel gazing”.  Volunteering, helping others, if you can all good, if you want to engage with other people more.  

Last word…I think the loneliest place I have experienced is that moment when you walk onto a stage with a live audience!  Most of you won’t have to experience that, but loneliness can pop up in the most unexpected situations!  

3 responses

  1. themovingdiva

    I grew up as an only child, no siblings and few “kids to play with” in my age group, until I was 7…and then I was a bit shy. (I outgrew that !) My Mother and I lived with her parents, my wonderful Grandparents, so my associates were MUCH older than I was, really two or more generations apart in many ways. My Grandparents were from the Victorian/Edwardian era and there were many societal disconnects with the 1950s. All this is not to say I was not happy….I was very happy, very busy “helping” and shadowing my Grandmother especially outside in the veg garden, and playing my own interior games with dolls and toys and crayons and paper (my favourite thing). I am so blessed to have had many years of close relationships with my Grandmother and other older family members. I didn’t know the meaning of “loneliness” and have never really felt that emptiness except a few very specific times, during marriage…when loneliness takes on a whole different meaning. I get along very well with myself and by myself, and generally prefer my own company to being in a “group” but that depends on the group. Isolation is not always a choice, it is often imposed upon one due to health or living circumstances or other influences/powers over which we have little control. Loneliness is, I truly believe, a situation we can do something about….we have a choice about what to do. I find this a very interesting topic without getting lost in the angst.

    Reply
  2. error of birth

    hello Mrs. JANE MERROW !
    i think loneliness is the only reality in existence ,
    to designate it a disease in modernity
    where all has the aspect of loud exasperating disease
    after all greed is a disease that has never been labelled as such
    does not only strike me as odd
    but it is its only viable option
    to defend its own disease ,
    where the viable likewise is non-existent
    when i hear the white doves
    deep down in my soul and
    innocent as the white snow
    that will never impinge upon
    human ground to be sullied
    play the sorrowful strings of their harps
    then i have entered my dream
    which no one can penetrate
    it is likewsie non-existent
    i have never been here
    loneliness is my sole companion
    and therein all becomes forgetfulness
    the entire force of falseness resolves
    that inflated refinement is repelled as self – deluded
    you should keep in mind that all the false
    inherent in values is being repeated again and again
    by those great men who are as lonley as anyone is
    as though they could thus gain in value !
    i think what loneliness prevents is that
    you do not walk into that prison
    resembling a pit of savage beasts
    to be torn by them alike
    the way they all behave alike
    after all , all pain is lonely
    because it is individual
    you cannot impart it to anyone else
    and yet we live in the concept of time
    which is applied to everyone in the same way
    thanks to physics , as though time new anything
    about you ,isn’t that absurd ? or is not time i
    an illusion ? everything is , because everything is fake
    following upon time to swell up deserted as common life
    you should not suffer yourself to be dispirited !
    there are wings to flap
    your own solitary ones
    to escape and fly away from
    all those imprisoned men
    in their imprisoned happiness and wealth
    and into a selfless dream that is your own
    that belongs to you and no one else
    that is not some commonplace
    where all people talk the same , learn the same , know the same ,
    teach the same to satiety as representatives of ” grand lettered reason ”
    to release those real white doves from your soul
    and yourself too , no more grey rain pattering
    down on you in the coldness of being in an icebound leaveless world
    over the edge of which you have tumbled and no one takes notice
    without a timorous light that flits off to rejoice your heart as your reflection…
    sincerely ,
    nobody but a poetical ephemeral dream
    not a memory to cling to to become oppressive
    null as everything in this knowing universe
    so that you can see what misknowledge
    has done to them all , prisoners without a dream ,
    without life but borne aloft by immortal gods
    in their cramped death – like torpor…

    Reply
    1. Jane Merrow acts

      Theresa May former UK PM called loneliness a
      Disease, it’s just semantics.

      Reply

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