Solitude vs. Loneliness…

“Loneliness is the poverty of self; solitude is the richness of self.”
May Sarton

This is a quote I have carried in my heart for over 40 years. And it is one May and I discussed when we met and became friends. I had read and reread and taught all of her books and as she was getting older I wanted to thank her. I wrote a long letter telling her how much her books meant to me, how I had read them often and taught them to my writing students, but how I returned to them again and again. I had a rubber stamp I put on the outside of the envelope, “Guilt Free Mail ~ No Reply Expected,” as she had so often written in her books that she loved getting mail but felt overwhelmed by the volume of mail she received. I told her I needed nothing in return, I simply wanted to thank her and to let her know how much her work had meant to me.

When she not only responded but called me on the telephone I was so shocked you could have knocked me over with a feather, and from that moment on we were fast friends until she died. I spoke to her 3 weeks before her death when her voice was barely a whisper. I never got over being stunned when one of my kids would call out to me as I worked in the garden, “Mom, May Sarton is on the phone.” I was 40 and she was nearly twice my age. And yet we felt like family. She said I was her sister, and it felt to her that I was a younger version of herself. And the odd thing was that we did indeed have an unusually close bond from the outset, and yet when she told me I would one day be living the life she lived, alone, concentrated on my writing, and more, I could not see what she already could. I was a happily married woman with 3 children I was homeschooling. She was a lesbian who had lived alone for a very long time.

And yet the night of my 45th birthday (that was a fluke, it just happened to be my birthday), my children nearly grown, 2 in college and one 16, I left my marriage and moved into a tiny garage apartment. My husband and I maintained a very cordial relationship and our son divided his time between the 2 of us until he was off on his own. I left because I had fallen in love with a woman, but the relationship ended in a few short months and after less than a handful of experiences with other women I was simply alone, for good and all, and I knew then that given my mental health issues I was far more at peace being alone. In fact it was a kind of peace I had never known and despite the fact that this was one of the hardest times in my life in many ways, I loved living alone. I spent my days writing, doing fiber art, gardening in a little patch of land, and finding out, at 45, who I really was. By the time I left May had passed away, but she not only wouldn’t have been surprised, she foretold that this day would come. From our hours long conversations she knew what I then could not see.

One of the things May and I talked a lot about — because I told her I had always loved the quote and it seemed to strike a deep chord in me — was the difference between loneliness and solitude. At the time, living in the middle of a family of 5 that I loved dearly, I felt painfully lonely. I couldn’t be who I really was, I never felt like I fit in anywhere, I was already agoraphobic though I didn’t know it at the time. I could get my kids the places they needed to go but I had longsince stopped leaving the house otherwise, and once I had left and given up on relationships, more than 20 years ago now, I have lived peacefully alone ever since. That doesn’t mean that life was easy, in fact it was very, very hard for many years, but I was at peace inside myself in a way I never had been.

May was happy in her solitude living alone, but she, like me, felt a stab of loneliness at times, and yet even when she visited with longterm friends that she dearly loved she was immensely relieved and only felt herself again when she was alone. I do feel a little lonely at times but very rarely. I have created a world that I love, with my animals, my writing and now my art, and living a life of my own design. Some of us are solitary animals, I was an only child, and the only time I felt safe was when I was alone. I was either terrified because I was being abused, or I was being chastised, scolded, punished and treated cruelly because I couldn’t live up to what others expected me to do, or thought I should do. I once wrote a piece called “Legless With Too Many Pairs Of Shoes” (You actually get this in a free eBook when you join my mailing list.) because it was as though my mother especially, and some others, couldn’t see that I was, metaphorically, legless, in a wheelchair, and they kept buying me pairs of shoes thinking if I had just the right pair I could get up and walk, inotherwords do what they wanted me to do, be what they wanted me to be, but I couldn’t. I was formed from some cracked and nearly broken mold and I wasn’t like anyone else anyone in the family knew. Of course I was adopted and I’m sure they figured that was part of the problem, but the childhood trauma I lived with nearly daily for too many years led me to go so deep inside myself I have never really come out. I do, very rarely, but now it is online. Except for my family I see no one.

And yet, I am a woman with a huge heart. I am a woman who loves and wants to help others. I try to do that through my writing and my art, and in the last 16 years well over 2 million people have visited this blog. I have written to them, and helped them, as much as I could, but I can take just so much interaction and no more.

I live a cloistered life, I spend much time in prayer, and silent contemplation. I have learned who I am, shy and introverted and not looking like I fit anywhere like the solitary octopus, the quiet air around me supports me, my little dog and my birds are my companions, my work is my life. I spend probably 90% of my life writing and drawing and planning how to live my life with the enormous changes I have been through these last 3 years.

How then, when you are a solitary soul, and you have gotten older, and you are disabled and daily in pain, needing to see doctors, have weekly therapy, and medication, do you manage? My life is manageable, if difficult at times, here alone, but sometimes I fear what will happen to me the day I cannot manage on my own. I try as hard as I can to be as self-sufficient as possible, to let go of the sadness of not being able to do things, like gardening, that have been lifelong passions, and I center on what I can do. In fact I am proud that I live a very rich life, one that I have worked hard to create and live each day, and at 68, with growing limitations, I continue to shapeshift and find more ways to enrich my life and days sitting right here in this chair which is hard for me to even get out of. And yet I am, for the most part, happy, at peace, and very, very grateful for all that I have, for my children and grandchildren, dear friends that stay in touch, and these days my Patrons at Patreon have become family to me and are supporting me to write my book.

I have changed the title and focus of my book, slightly, in form and intention, to reflect what I really want to say and share. It all started with a little drawing I did a little while ago…

Those words came from someplace very deep inside of me, and knowing, acknowledging, that I am “in the deepening autumn of my life” led me to rethink the book that I was writing. It couldn’t be fiction, it couldn’t be a self-help book, it had to be my story, in the way that if we go deep enough with our stories we touch down on the universal. I believe that in telling the truth of my life and existence, how I live, how I cope, how I do my work, and how, like the Phoenix, I continue to rise above tragedy, and loss, and sometimes unspeakable sadness. Somehow or another, despite the fact that I hurt so bad when I wake up I can hardly get up, I finally do, and moving very, very slowly I take care of my animals, I get the household going, I make coffee, and I bring it here to my desk where I begin again to write and draw and dream and pray for help and guidance with my work, and thank God for all the many blessings in my life. My 3 children are happy and healthy with wonderful spouses and beautiful children, I now have 5 grandchildren, and could you tell me what I could possibly complain about given all of that?

And so I drew the picture above, and the words deepening autumn, deepening autumn, deepening autumn continues to echo through my mind like a Buddhist chant, and then, gracious, I nearly sat bolt upright out of sleep, a title came to me — “Autumn Harvest: The Diary of a Woman in the Deepening Autumn of Her Life.” This is exactly what I need to write about. We all move through the cycles and seasons of our lives, we none of us can begin to know what will come our way, no matter how much we plan and exercise and eat a good diet and try to be good people, life will happen. That’s all we can know. So the only thing that we can do is make the very best of each day that we can, and accept, with as much grace as we can muster, what may come tomorrow.

The last 2 weeks have been very hard for me. The pain has been particularly bad. I go back to the doctor on the 20th and shall likely at that time begin in-home physical therapy again. I can’t stand in my kitchen and do anything. I have a rollator walker with a seat and I have to sit in it to make my coffee in the morning, to do dishes, to cook whatever I am able to cook. My life continues to shapeshift, and I continue to find my way. My hope, my prayer, is that sharing my journey may help others with theirs. I will try my best.

I feel exceedingly shy to bring up Patreon but the Patrons that I do have, the bit of money I make each month from the people who support me, are a Godsend to me, are helping me to do my work, buy the art and office supplies that I need, and even to buy groceries. I live on social security and now have medical issues and a number of medications to contend with. I will do my work no matter what, but if you have followed this blog for years, or like the drawings and writings I put out on social media, your support as a Patron could help me more than I can say for as little as $5 a month for which you get many benefits: blog posts for Patrons only, free downloadable art every month, and so much more. I would so very deeply appreciate it, if you are interested and able, for you to join my Patreon. You can click on the link above, or on the right side of this site, or write to me through this website if you have any questions. You’ve no idea how hard it is to ask for help, but I really need it and am working very hard to repay my Patrons for their kindness and support to help me get my work out into the world.

Many blessings and much love to one and all…