Although summer is a time of rest for people who operate by a schedule in semesters, summer can also be lonely. When I’m home during the day, I am busy: the New Testament course, practicing with an interpreting mentor, a self-paced course on medical interpreting, book club with Biscuit, watching horror movies, reading blog comments, reading blog posts and commenting, taking workshops to prepare myself for a licensing test, going to the gym, getting allergy shots and visiting a wellness coach, etc. It’s a lot, truly. Honestly, though, most of what I am doing takes places in solitude. I’m writing on discussion boards and reading on the couch, I’m exercising on a machine and waiting 30 minutes alone after a quick injection.
This week, on the morning news a doctor said that loneliness can have the same negative health effects as smoking fifteen cigarettes per day. I’m not sure how they measure something like that because isn’t loneliness subjective? A cigarette can be measured in weight or length, but a feeling is evanescent. Isn’t it? I’m not sure sure anymore.
On Thursday my wellness coach asked me if I could be more present and ask myself what I need. Finally, Friday night as Nick headed into his home office to play poker with his friends and I got ready to watch a horror movie, it dawned on me that I spend so much time near Nick but not with Nick. Essentially, we’re in the same space but not sharing it, like when we’re both reading on the couch and our legs are touching, or when we’re sitting side by side to watch a movie, or if we go out to a restaurant and both agree that it’s been a taxing day, so we look at our phones. We never saw a problem with this, and I still don’t, to a degree. Everyone needs rest from the efforts required for good communication (I find listening particularly hard at times).
But what changes in the summer is I am face-to-face communicating with hardly anyone. The allergy nurse who asks me if I have “have any plans for the weekend?” And I usually respond
Anyway. I do talk to Biscuit twice per week, but two hours of conversation each week is not enough for anyone. So, Saturday morning when Nick asked what my goals for the day were, I said, “To have fun with you.” He asked, “What else?” and I replied, “That’s it.” When that wellness coach asked me if I could check in frequently, asking myself what I need, she was right that it would have a profound impact. Most of the time I don’t know what I need, which is a function of anxiety because people with anxiety live in two places: ruminating in the past and worrying about the future. We’re rarely present.
Thus, a day of fun ensued, but the main part was we did not focus on other things. I didn’t start the audiobook in my car, Nick didn’t look at his phone throughout lunch, and we talked and talked. I admit I carried most of the conversation, but it was new for us to try this. When you’ve been together a long time, it’s easy to say that we’re just comfortable being around each other. And it’s true! But what does “being around each other” mean in the larger picture of loneliness and disconnect?
This is not an anti-technology post. We also did not read our books or just sit and look at the scene around us quietly. We played a game of “Eye Spy” in ASL, which allowed me to teach Nick new signs and how they change based on perspective (such as BEACH when you’re on the sand versus in the water). It was a beautiful day that I will try again next weekend with different activities but the same goal.
Grab the Lapels 
I love this so much! I am happy you and Nick had such a fun day together. It is so easy to be alone together when you’ve known someone a long time. Summer at my work is very quiet. I’m alone at the library service desk and hardly any students come to the desk for anything, so that when a coworker or student or anyone comes up I’m so excited to talk to another human that I just start babbling on and on. I hope you are able to figure out what it is you need and express that on a regular basis!
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If things are so slow during the summer, what is it they want you to do all day? You’re so much more knowledgeable than just being a warm body in a chair!
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Summer is project time in the library, lots of dusting, shelf reading, shifting books to make room for more books. But also helping professors with their research. and currently things are ramping up for electronic reserves for fall classes. It’s quiet, but definitely not dull or boring!
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I can’t think of the last time I had a professor use an electronic reserve! 15+ years ago we had them all the time.
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Electronic reserves are in place of making students buy printed course packets and sometimes even textbooks. Why make a student buy a $300 casebook when most of them can be linked into their canvas class via Westlaw for free (to the student since the library pays for their subscription)
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I hear you. This – “people with anxiety live in two places: ruminating in the past and worrying about the future. We’re rarely present” – is so clear. I hadn’t really thought about it that way but I will remember when dealing with the anxious people in my life.
But what I really heard was that thing about being NEAR but not WITH. It’s something I’ve been talking to and Gums about a bit lately. We spend a lot of time together but not a lot of it is really engaging with each other. This week we did something different in terms of an outing and it gave us both a lift. We just have to keep working at our relationships don’t we? Thanks so much for sharing all this from your heart. It’s truly generous.
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I’ve never thought of my writing as being generous, and now I feel all squishy. My dad kept telling my mom that he is lonely, and to be fair he works alone all day long, but he would say it to her, while they had been sitting there together, so she has feelings about it, like why doesn’t she count as a person. I get what she’s saying, but after I felt something similar, I started to put things together. There have been times when I was sitting next to Nick and said, “I miss you” and felt like something was wrong with me for saying that.
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Good squishy I hope.
I once said an awful thing to my sister, and to this day I still don’t know why I said it. But, when we were in our early 20s she was visiting me here in Canberra, and I poured myself a glass of pre-dinner sherry and said “I always drink when I’m alone”! What? Firstly, how insulting, as I wasn’t alone but with her. And secondly, that wasn’t really true anyhow. I often in those days had a pre-dinner apperitif-type drink – alone or with my housemates. Anyhow, the thing is, she just looked at me and we had a laugh, but really, what was I thinking! My lovely sister.
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Squishy is always good. 💕
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Great! I think so too …
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I’ve been lonely since I retired (early, so no one else I know is retired yet). I think it’s not a coincidence there are so many of us who like to talk to each other on blogs about what we’re reading.
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Jeanne, I’m so sorry to hear that. Has your family suggested anything to quell the loneliness while they are busy? Sometimes I wonder if a phone call would help (like right now, I really, really want to talk to Nick, but he’s at work and I’m at home because it’s summer break). I did start a book club that is (mostly) just my mom and I, and we meet twice per week with a set stopping point in the book each time (usually about 75 pages per meeting). Much of that meeting is visiting; it seems like the reading is the excuse.
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My son and his new wife are moving back to my town and they’ve asked me if I will do a lot of the babysitting for the baby they’re planning to have. I said yes! I was just at the inspection for the house they’ve put in an offer on! They will be here sometime in the fall!
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Hurry up, Baby! Also, it’s nice that your family will be closer to you.
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I’m so glad you had such a fun day with Nick! I know at least part of the answer to the question about how they measure loneliness, though. One of the fields of research that looks into it is social network research (named pre-social media!). It looks at the amount and quality of connections that people have in their lives, and while it’s not possible to measure that directly, they’ve got pretty good at measuring proxies. People with robust social networks who have long-term conditions tend to live longer, with fewer complications. They use questions like “who would you talk to if you needed to borrow £50? Who would you go to if your spouse died? Who would you talk to if you wanted an evening out?” etc, because a variety of different connections is important to all of us.
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Oh! I think I know what you mean! I’ve been asked many times during medical/mental health appointments if I have someone to call, and I always answer yes. It’s since occurred to me that those are people I would call in an emergency, not casually, because they mostly text or blog with me. If someone asked, “Who would you call for a lunch date on Friday,” I would struggle. I’m going to see if there is an online version of that test and take it.
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Well, I think there are a lot of versions adapted for different research foci – but if you look on google scholar for papers about social network analysis and loneliness, you might find the paper that doctor was summarising on the radio. It’s not as much of a straightforward 1:1 relationship as the example makes it sound – it’s just that using analogies makes it more concrete and is easier than going into all the ins and outs of the theory.
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Perhaps Milly and I live separately because when we’re in the same space we discuss stuff (sometimes stuff we’ve read or seen but more often kids and grandkids). But if I even glance at the phone I am in serious trouble! And we’ve learnt the hard way that if something is going wrong, talk about it!
That said, I go days not talking to anyone at all, then as someone above said, babbling whenever I’m actually in the presence of another person. It doesn’t help that I hate the phone.
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I think you are also not a fan of Zoom meetings, as I recall trying to get you to do a Zoom meetup with me during COVID, and you were not into it. Then again, Zoom is basically the phone + a face. I like that better because at least I can see the other person’s face and get all the body language.
Are you saying that if you and Milly lived together, you would talk too much? Or is it the topic of family, and hashing it over constantly, that makes it better to live separately?
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No, the opposite, that because we aren’t together all the time when we do meet we talk, and surprisingly often, talk meaningfully.
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This is such a lovely thoughtful post.
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Thank you.
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Man this post really spoke to me. I am so that person who is either living in the past, or worrying about the future. I really need help just enjoying the moment, but who do I do that? Any tips for me? haha
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With the wellness coach, we talked about mindfulness. Internally, I rolled my eyes. But then we tried something weird. She talked about just paying attention to my feet. What did they feel like, what did I notice, what had I not known about my feet beforehand. I know that sounds weird, but I think the point is that you’re training your brain to notice things that you don’t normally pay attention to. You notice, a thought springs from what you notice, and now you’re thinking about the present. I also have a lot of tools that I use from the year that I spent in cognitive behavioral therapy. I know most people can’t afford a year of therapy, and I was lucky that my local community has PHD candidates in psychology who offer therapy for $10 per session. But basically, during that year I was unlearning a lot of things and getting new tools.
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This feet tip is a good one!!!! I’m going to try to use it.
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This post speaks to me too. I’m feeling lonely lately and also have a hard time figuring out what I want! Thank you for sharing your experiences and experiments.
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You’re welcome. We’re having a harder time this weekend recreating that feeling of togetherness because things have gotten in the way. There is still tomorrow (Sunday) for us to come up with something. It is a BIZARRE feeling to be lonely around people, but I do think it’s about whether we trust a person enough to connect deeply with them, and THEN if we are capable.
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