On Loneliness and Patience and Weather

By Catherine DiMercurio

Sometimes I’m never lonely at all and sometimes it’s always winter. If there’s one thing I’ve learned about loneliness is that you don’t talk about it. Discussing it creates an awkwardness people don’t know what to do with, which leaves me with the feeling that I’m somehow obligated to feel shame about it, as if I have done something wrong by putting myself in this position.

The hard thing is that casual social interactions don’t assuage the type of loneliness that strikes me sometimes. It’s true that making new friends in a new place can be challenging, and I do feel the ache of that sometimes as I’m adjusting to life in my new town, but what is harder for me is the realization that none of the relationships I tried to build in the past ever blossomed into something with the kind of longevity I once hoped to be enjoying at this point in my life. There were recurring losses: of the possibility of various futures, of that close emotional intimacy with someone who really gets you.

Which is not to say these endings weren’t necessary. But also, I didn’t anticipate the way those accumulated losses would feel over time. What is astonishing is the way my own perceptions of loss and gain shift and morph. There’s a certain bliss I cherish, the peace that I have gained/earned that is the absence of the friction of being with the wrong person. [Obviously, friction happens, even with the right person, but with the right person, there’s enough underlying love and good will that occasional friction is simply something to work around.] There is also the absence of the anxiety I felt being with emotionally unavailable partners, an absence of the loneliness I felt upon recognizing when someone did not have the capacity to try to hold my pain as fully and as tenderly as I tried to hold theirs. And yet, sometimes the absence of not having someone to lean on, a shoulder to cry on, feels greater than those things. At times it seems I’ve traded one type of loneliness for another.

And then, the next day or the next week, I feel changed. Clear headed. When we’re in the depths of loneliness and the grief that comes with it, it’s easy to identify with it entirely. When it lifts it’s plain that it was not so much “just a feeling” but more like the weather, more like atmosphere, something we breathe in, something that impacts our daily living. But also, something that shifts, changes, improves. I wonder if in some language, the way we say I’m lonely is in my heart there is bad weather.

What I keep relearning is that so much of everyone’s lives involves the intricacies and negotiations of competing compensations: I lack this, but I have that, and this compensation is amenable to me. I have also found that winter whittles away at the balance that can be easier to find throughout the rest of the year. On a recent rare sunny day, I found that the gloomy internal cloud that made me feel so dark had dissipated and I wondered if all I’d really been missing was the sunlight on my face.

I’ve started pottery again. Waitlisted for a long while at a couple of studios, I decided to take matters into my own hands and set up a small studio in my basement. I found another potter who rents out kiln space. While this set up means I’m losing the social connections of a pottery studio community, it means I’m gaining the flexibility to be creative on my own schedule, rather than being tied to studio availability. There are other losses and other gains of this set up. It is amenable to me. It’s also been about as challenging as I expected it to be, reintroducing my hands to clay, to the wheel. I enjoy practicing. I love it when I easily center the clay and pull up nice even walls. It’s disappointing when I fail to do so. And I hate that I’m frustrated by such minor failures. I want to be a person who sees failure as part of the process, to respect it as such. I want to be in love with the whole process, not just the successes. Once again, pottery teaches me about life.

This winter has been a long process of slow growth and many frustrations, and little griefs that I mistakenly have counted as failures. But also it’s been a winter of little joys that don’t get celebrated enough, that I don’t celebrate enough.

I once had a pottery instructor tell me you’re really bad at being patient with yourself. She also admonished me on more than one occasion to not be so hard on myself. It’s not that I expect to make flawless art, but it is true that I’m constantly changing the rules for myself about what “good” and “enough” look like. I have learned that I often create a sense of urgency in situations where there really isn’t one, as if I have to get things “right” as quickly as possible. I’m trying to pause when that kicks in so I can discern if the urgency is real, so I can slow things down, let growth happen. So I can practice. So I can appreciate practice and process, all of it, in all kinds of weather.

It’s mid-February and winter isn’t over by a longshot, but you can sort of see spring out there, off in the distance. I feel a shift beginning, where I can recognize that while I’ve had some low points this winter in terms of my mental health, I can also give myself credit for the on-going process of getting through my first lakeside winter.

Sometimes you need to write about loneliness or grief or the failures so necessary for growth in order to explain it all to yourself. Concepts like loneliness become transmuted into something solid, into a noun, into a thing to be turned over in your hands like a stone worn smooth by water, instead of a verb that scrapes across your heart and leaves it feeling like a skinned knee.

I feel as though I’m losing a little of the hollow feeling that has plagued me on and off over the years. It used to be that I believed myself less hollow when I was in a relationship. But after I had a long stretch of solitude/solo-ness/single-hood [I don’t know which nomenclature I prefer] and the hollowness began to fill in, I thought, don’t ever lose this, don’t ever forget how full you can feel on your own. I hadn’t known truly, up until that point, that it was possible.

[When I did meet someone new, I was fearful of losing what I’d gained. I think part of me fought the relationship the whole time, and part of me fought for it because it did have many good qualities. I talked about the struggle with him, not wanting to fight this war alone. But I suppose once the other person knows there’s a war they don’t feel much like fighting with you, or for you.]

So now I’m in the process of filling the hollow back in with the marrow of my own living. It looks like beach sand in my pockets, driftwood and rocks all over the house, clay beneath my fingernails, notebooks with random thoughts and little poems. Sometimes, too, it looks like loneliness clutched to my chest, a ruined lump of clay I couldn’t center, a dog struggling with his own anxiety despite my efforts to help. But, weather shifts. Atmospheric patterns change. It’s true that some griefs don’t ever truly abate, and a little part of our heart might always be stormy, but a heart is a great big world and the clouds can clear in other territories within it. It’s just hard to be patient with the process sometimes, especially in winter. But there’s no shame in any of it.

Be well. Be patient.

Love, Cath

On Lanterns, Looking, and Home

By Catherine DiMercurio

Many people have been inspired by the line Emily Dickinson wrote to a friend, “I am out with lanterns, looking for myself.” It struck me today too, as I came across it again.

Recently, I was texting with my firstborn, about various things, but the conversation turned to the idea of home. Several months ago, I helped them and their partner move from the house they’d been living in with too many college housemates into their own place, one of those quirky Ann Arbor apartments comprised of a collection of rooms in an older house. It is cozy and suits them. My child was telling me that they finally have a place that feels like a home that is their own. This delights me: my child feels safe and happy, in their own place, in a healthy relationship.

Less recently, though it still feels like yesterday to me, I moved out of the house I’d lived in for twenty years, raised my kids in, lived the best and worst years of my marriage in, into this little ranch house in a different suburb, not far away but very far away from where I used to be. And I only feel that my new house is home some of the time. I do love what I’ve built here, that this house is a reflection of my personality, filled with books, watercolors, pottery, artwork from friends, and dogs. It is cozy and it suits me. But sometimes, it doesn’t feel quite exactly right. It’s like a newish shirt you mostly love but when you put it on you remember that the tag is itchy. Sometimes. Other times, like now, everything feels safe and good, happy and peaceful. It’s early morning and I’m drinking coffee from a mug I threw and glazed myself. I’m snug under a blanket I crocheted years ago. The puppy is cuddled up next to me. I’ve decorated a small tree—my solstice/Christmas/winter magic tree—and strung up some colorful lights. I feel lucky. I have created peace and stability for myself in a way that several years ago I wouldn’t have ever thought possible.

When I feel restless, or have that what am I doing here feeling, I know where it comes from now. When loneliness hits, it is usually from two directions. One is from the past, from the part of my life where I woke up in the same house as my children for the first 18 years of their lives. I don’t think it matters how full your life is as an empty nester; part of you is always aware that the loss you know was coming is happening. That empty space takes up space. The other direction loneliness attacks from is from the future. We all have points in our lives, after the loss of a meaningful relationship, where it feels as though the future we had anticipated is being erased, like an Etch-a-Sketch turned upside down and vigorously shaken. As new relationships unfold, we wonder, is this the future, beginning to take shape? When those dissolve too, it feels like starting all over, with the future blank again.

I also keep forgetting that “the future” is not a single fixed point. It is hard to embrace the idea that nothing is really fixed, as in, a single unchanging point in time, and fixed, as in finally and fully repaired. Everything is in perpetual motion, our healing, and where we’re headed. What happens next is the same thing as how am I continuing to grow, and it appears in my mind like night, with a sky full of stars, and I’m out wandering, with my lanterns.

Photo by Burak The Weekender on Pexels.com

And all of this is tied into the idea of home for me. The house I currently live in blinks on and off, in a way. It feels like home, and then it flickers, and the feeling fades, and then it’s back on, steady as ever. What I’m beginning to realize is that it is less about this house and how long I’ve been in it, and whether or not my kids have lived here, and more about me being at home with myself. This feeling is getting stronger and stronger with me, after years of faltering, and looking for home in someone else. I didn’t even know that feeling that way about myself was possible, or important, until recently. It’s beautiful to think of home as either where you were raised, or, being with the people who love you regardless of your physical location or place of residence. But feeling at home with yourself, knowing that you are the safe place and you are the someone who loves you, that is something else entirely. I love that this is happening for me, that I finally thought to look for it, and that the feeling is becoming fuller and steadier.

Sometimes when I’m out with those lanterns, I’m not really looking for myself anymore. Sometimes I’m feeling found, and I’m just enjoying a starry walk with myself. But I do know that everything changes, especially selves, and that I am no more a fixed point than anything in future. So, to some degree, I’ll have to be out looking with some regularity. Sometimes that’s a scary thought and sometimes I’m just tired, but it feels important and necessary.

I keep returning to these same ideas over and over but sometimes we need to keep hearing the same message, whether from ourselves or from outside sources, multiple times as we learn and grow and acclimate ourselves to new ways of looking at things. For me, this is part of being open hearted. To grow, I need to be patient with myself, with the way I learn and the pace at which I learn. So I’ll be out there with lanterns, as usual. Maybe I’ll see you there.

Love, Cath

On Windmills and Waterfalls, Dreaming and Doing

By Catherine DiMercurio

Sometimes we have to protect and feed our energy.

I love a morning moon. Recently I stood under a 5 a.m. waning gibbous, after the harvest moon. I’m not sure what planet glowed nearby but between the moon, the planet, the still bright stars, and a symphony of crickets, letting the dogs out that early was quite pleasant. It was good energy to begin the day on.

I’ve been thinking a lot about energy lately. My sister recently told me about a dream she had, involving the two of us and a windmill and a waterfall. I feel things churning toward change, as if I’m at some sort of turning point but I haven’t yet discerned what’s next or where exactly I am. I liked the symbols of energy and power she spoke of.

I’ve had strange dreams about energy as well. One was about electrical cords that were plugged in in strange places, like across the room instead of the nearest outlet, so I was always tripping over them. Another was about a horse. My kids and dogs and I were in the pen with him, and he was alternately restless and bucking, or nuzzling us. Finally, we realized he was hungry, and after we fed him, he was content. This beautiful creature was trying to tell me something simple and urgent, and was getting impatient that I couldn’t figure it out. These dreams left me feeling as though I should be doing something.

On another recent morning, I stood outside at dawn, and white clouds blanketed the sky. I couldn’t get a sense of the sun rising so much as the sky began to lighten every so gradually. And I thought, maybe some transitions are like that. Soft, quiet, and so subtle you don’t notice they’re happening. So unobtrusive you can’t tell where the light is coming from. They are not full of do-ing energy but with be-ing energy.

What is the right balance between energetically pursuing your dreams and patiently waiting for your efforts to pay off? When I look at where I am, what I’m doing, and what I want, it’s unclear where I should focus my energy. Sort of. I am pursuing my writing goals; I’m not yet it a position to pursue my dream of living by woods or water; I’m feeding my creative needs not only with writing but with pottery; I’m maintaining friendships, and trying to be a good dog guardian, and doing my best to be there for my kids to the extent that they still need me to be. But a question mark hovers in the relationship category.

For a long time, I thought if I experienced loneliness, then I was not doing the “being on my own” thing properly. As if I had to prove that solo was perfect and right for me by being fine all the time. But everyone gets lonely. That doesn’t mean I’m failing. Occasional loneliness is a normal thing for everyone, for people in relationships and for people not in relationships. There are going to be times when the feeling crests, but that doesn’t mean it has to swallow us up.

I was hiking this weekend, and while I often find a friend to go with, on this occasion, my usual hiking buddies were busy, so I went alone. I was excited to explore a different part of my usual trail. While doing so, a couple came up behind me. They were walking a bit faster than I was, and to avoid a prolonged period of stalking right at my heels, they said to one another, “want to do a little trot here?” and they jogged past me and got far enough ahead that I wouldn’t be encroaching on them.

When I thought of the ease they had with one another, and having heard snippets of their conversation, I felt a sudden piercing burst of loneliness that brought tears to my eyes. How beautiful to have a likeminded partner to share a hike with, to be so familiar with one another that the conversation flows, and you instinctively communicate with one another on the trail. I thought of my past relationships, and how little we actually had in common in terms of how we enjoyed spending our free time. It’s easy in a moment of loneliness to slide further and further into the past. But I also had the very conscious thought that I did not want to let this bitter pang to continue intruding on my current joy.

I remembered something—a tool to help ground you when you’re feeling anxiety or grief taking over. I knew I needed to firmly root myself into the present moment, the beautiful experience I was having out in the world, not the twists and turns inside my head and heart. I reached out, letting my fingertips skim the bark of a beech tree, and then the next tree, and the next. I took deep breaths of woodsy air, warm and humid on this September morning. I looked down. At my feet was a fallen yellow leaf, of a shape I couldn’t quite identify. It didn’t look like anything around it. I thought it was vaguely poplar shaped, but oddly asymmetrical. I carried it with me, rubbing it between my fingers as though it were a talisman helping me ward off evil.

Because it was. Not that our emotions themselves are evil. But here’s the thing. There’s a difference between noticing/feeling your emotions and having them bond with anxiety in that toxic way they sometimes do. Anxiety distorts our emotions, mutates them. It’s a bad combo. I saw that beautiful couple being awesome in the woods together, and the emotions came at me hard and fast. Grief, loneliness, the confusion of “have I ever had that?” I felt it all in an instant. But I knew anxiety was kicking in when I began to ask the “what if” questions. What if I never find it, etc. That’s when I reached out to the trees for help. We have to know when to reach out.

Funny that I found a little distorted leaf that looked like it didn’t belong anywhere since that’s exactly how I was feeling. It’s like the woods were saying, “you’re not alone.” And that’s also when I realized that feeling lonely doesn’t undermine any progress we’ve made with self-trust and healing. It is simply another emotion. We notice it, feel it, and it’s a good sign when we can prevent it from pairing up with anxiety.

I was pleased that I’d managed to hold onto the good energy, to nurture it. But what of the other energy, the dream energy that seemed to be urging me to do, to act. Was it relationship related? Am I ready to try again? Or is it better to simply be, be me, be open to possibility, to wait and see what happens?

So much of what we want in life, so many of our dreams, are not entirely within our control, so it’s no wonder that it’s confusing when we consider how much energy to put into something. I think we have to listen to what our dreams are pointing us to, but they can be hard to interpret. Maybe the doing my subconscious was hinting at was about simply protecting my own energy. Not wasting it. Feeding it. Maybe it was about reassurance, a reminder to keep tending and keep trusting.

Love, Cath