"...Supporting Loneliness since 1995-ish"
(Nah, not "soportando". I don't do false friends.)
The newsgroup asl (alt.support.loneliness) was my first port of call on the Net: believe or not, I was there before I even discovered e-porn. On careful reflection, I'm somewhat glad that Google coprophagised the first few terabytes of Dejanews when it assumed custody. Only somewhat, though. I'm almost certain that somewhere in the frozen wastes of drear - the intense, earnest discussions about whether it was right for an Italian maths professor to use words like "cunt" and "giggle" in his posts (I thought it was, but what did I know?) - there must have been something of merit, or at least something capable of inspiring a little harmless nostalgia years later:
https://groups.google.com/d/msg/alt.support.loneliness/OJpJOzbYrF4/M0CpdcQ6mZ0J
Or perhaps I deceive myself. Perhaps I did only ever write shyte. This reflection comes to you after I find myself attacked in the comments section of someone's blog for being a "feminist". The idea that anyone who encounters me on the Net could possibly mistake me for a feminist strikes me as bizarre, even comical (it's probably easier to mistake me for one in real life, as one Scottish colleague years back once did, but then again, it's probably equally easy to mistake me for a serial killer, an entomologist, a zombie, a civil engineer, or - vide certain dogs - a lamp-post: I have one of these what you might call "Nothing Faces", upon which anyone is free to project their personal fantasy, provided said fantasy does not involve the person, or fixture, having too many teeth); apart from comical, though, it's a reminder that communication across certain boundaries doesn't get easier the older you get.
I always found it hard to talk to Canadians, for some reason. They seem to have an almost eerie flair for getting the wrong end of the stick (some would add "and of the 49th parallel", but that's probably another story). But the proven, confessed Canadianness of my interlocutor doesn't explain it all. I think it's me. I really do think it is me.
Which brings me to loneliness. I used to think that a remote history of posting, albeit incoherently and inconsequentially, on a loneliness newsgroup, was something to be embarrassed about. I have now revised this opinion. So much so that, today, I find myself marvelling that Spanish does not have a word for loneliness. I think it should have. I shall now attempt to explain why.
Loneliness, consensually, has nothing to do with being alone or not (soledad in Garcíamarquezspeak). It's also, clearly, not a stigma: Elvis, Sting, Ferry and a whole host of obviously-not-lonely pop singers complained of it, apparently under the illusion that (like shyness, discussed here way back) lonely is kind of a cool thing to be: it shows depth, donchaknow. Thing is, though, like shyness, many are called but few chosen: not everyone who says she is lonely really is so, and there are a lot of faux-monnayeurs out there. In order to be lonely, you have to actually have some sharp edges, something that prevents you from sinking at will into the cotton-wool comfort of the idée recue, of the Moral Majority, of the Twittosphere, of facebooktopia, without tearing through the delicate fabric that holds such things in permanent suspension above the rocks, and stones, and trees. That's one thing. The other: you have to actually want company.
That doesn't mean wanting to be not lonely. I wouldn't swap my loneliness for any company in the world. The reason is simple: if I did, if I gave up being lonely to be "with" someone, then I would cease to have any reason to want to be with her, and worse, I would have nothing to actually offer her. I would have no soul, and I'm old-fashioned enough to think having one is important in a relationship. Genuinely lonely people tend to see company not as a cure but as a reward, or encouragement. If you want to be cured of your loneliness, then what you have is more likely to be some form of untreated codependence (I would say "get help", but that's kind of self-defeating: "get no help!" would be a wiser prescription, perhaps - at least, it worked for me all those years ago). What the lonely person wants is not to be free of those sharp edges, but to find a fit for them. That's very different.
The other day a friend-of-family I was driving home asked me if I feared death. I immediately consigned the outraged response "do I look like someone who fears death?" to the same mental waste paper basket already inhabited by, inter alia, "do I look like a feminist?" and decided on a more considered response. "Well, if you mean being dead, then no, I don't fear that at all. In fact, I rather like the idea: after all, dead people don't have to go to work. But I must admit I'm not too crazy about dying. I've heard, from several extremely reliable sources, that it's quite painful: more so, even, than the toothache which currently afflicts me. So, yeah, I suppose you could say I fear dying, at least." He nodded, and the conversation changed to something more upbeat. What I should have added, though, is this: apart from the actual mechanics of dying, the shooting pains in the shoulder and chest region and all of that, the eruption of panic hormones, there's one little niggling caveat I have, I think I've always had, about being dead. It is this: sometimes I suspect that, when I am dead, there will be something missing in the universe. And I don't mean myself: that would be egotistical. I'm Catholic-educated enough to be aware that selves, as in egos, are featureless, interchangeable and quite boring things: they are that which God wishes you would stop having, and be done with it. Even as an atheist, I can't help thinking God was right about that one. Self is a bore. I think I probably had a bit too much self until around the age of 40, after which I started cutting back, and feeling, in the long run, much better for it. So it ain't that.
What is this thing that I think might be missing when I am dead, then? I wish I knew. This blog, and everything I have ever written elsewhere, is a, to date, failed attempt to answer that question. If only I could isolate what it was to be me, and get it down in writing, then I could die in peace, truly in peace: people could then decide to either reproduce these gobbets of me-ness in their own experience, selectively and at their own risk, or cork them into test-tubes and store them on some windswept moorland Research Facility with a skull and crossbones label as a warning. So, then. Is it the ideas? But mine are so unoriginal, so half-assed, so tentative and underdeveloped. It can't be those. Is it the feelings, then? That seems closer, but not entirely there: my repertoire of feelings strikes me as, if robust, somewhat less than Proustian. Is it the images? Is it this constant interior monolog I have in which, instead of words, I have shadows falling across paths, strange trees, yellowhammers, talkative skies, rain-sodden riverbanks, departing thighs? Doesn't everyone have those? How would one tell? And what does it matter anyway? Why would anyone even want there to be a me anywhere? If someone did, wouldn't they have told me so by now?
Ultimately, the only answer I have ever thought of to that last question is provided by loneliness. The only possible reason for there to continue to be a me would be if somewhere, there was a her to match: the exact proposition that Loneliness, qua faith, insists we accept without evidence. If there was, and they made contact, then sense would be born. The Voynich manuscript would suddenly be readable. Cold fusion would suddenly be commonplace. In fact, the image of an explosion, of a huge release of energy, kind of nails it for me. That's what would happen the day I made enough partial sense about something important for someone to think: yeah. Just yeah. But, going by this morning's outing, that ain't gonna happen anytime soon. Hell, if I can be mistaken for a feminist, of all things (and, get this, someone who makes "generalized sexist statements against males"), then I could be given a bonus 2,000 years of writing time and still not get it down pat. And that, again, is a loneliness maker. My sharp edges must be sharper than I thought.
P.S. 186 visits in 2 days? Odd's Bodikins. I really must remember to be misinterpreted by Canadian YouTube celebrities more often.
The newsgroup asl (alt.support.loneliness) was my first port of call on the Net: believe or not, I was there before I even discovered e-porn. On careful reflection, I'm somewhat glad that Google coprophagised the first few terabytes of Dejanews when it assumed custody. Only somewhat, though. I'm almost certain that somewhere in the frozen wastes of drear - the intense, earnest discussions about whether it was right for an Italian maths professor to use words like "cunt" and "giggle" in his posts (I thought it was, but what did I know?) - there must have been something of merit, or at least something capable of inspiring a little harmless nostalgia years later:
https://groups.google.com/d/msg/alt.support.loneliness/OJpJOzbYrF4/M0CpdcQ6mZ0J
Or perhaps I deceive myself. Perhaps I did only ever write shyte. This reflection comes to you after I find myself attacked in the comments section of someone's blog for being a "feminist". The idea that anyone who encounters me on the Net could possibly mistake me for a feminist strikes me as bizarre, even comical (it's probably easier to mistake me for one in real life, as one Scottish colleague years back once did, but then again, it's probably equally easy to mistake me for a serial killer, an entomologist, a zombie, a civil engineer, or - vide certain dogs - a lamp-post: I have one of these what you might call "Nothing Faces", upon which anyone is free to project their personal fantasy, provided said fantasy does not involve the person, or fixture, having too many teeth); apart from comical, though, it's a reminder that communication across certain boundaries doesn't get easier the older you get.
I always found it hard to talk to Canadians, for some reason. They seem to have an almost eerie flair for getting the wrong end of the stick (some would add "and of the 49th parallel", but that's probably another story). But the proven, confessed Canadianness of my interlocutor doesn't explain it all. I think it's me. I really do think it is me.
Which brings me to loneliness. I used to think that a remote history of posting, albeit incoherently and inconsequentially, on a loneliness newsgroup, was something to be embarrassed about. I have now revised this opinion. So much so that, today, I find myself marvelling that Spanish does not have a word for loneliness. I think it should have. I shall now attempt to explain why.
Loneliness, consensually, has nothing to do with being alone or not (soledad in Garcíamarquezspeak). It's also, clearly, not a stigma: Elvis, Sting, Ferry and a whole host of obviously-not-lonely pop singers complained of it, apparently under the illusion that (like shyness, discussed here way back) lonely is kind of a cool thing to be: it shows depth, donchaknow. Thing is, though, like shyness, many are called but few chosen: not everyone who says she is lonely really is so, and there are a lot of faux-monnayeurs out there. In order to be lonely, you have to actually have some sharp edges, something that prevents you from sinking at will into the cotton-wool comfort of the idée recue, of the Moral Majority, of the Twittosphere, of facebooktopia, without tearing through the delicate fabric that holds such things in permanent suspension above the rocks, and stones, and trees. That's one thing. The other: you have to actually want company.
That doesn't mean wanting to be not lonely. I wouldn't swap my loneliness for any company in the world. The reason is simple: if I did, if I gave up being lonely to be "with" someone, then I would cease to have any reason to want to be with her, and worse, I would have nothing to actually offer her. I would have no soul, and I'm old-fashioned enough to think having one is important in a relationship. Genuinely lonely people tend to see company not as a cure but as a reward, or encouragement. If you want to be cured of your loneliness, then what you have is more likely to be some form of untreated codependence (I would say "get help", but that's kind of self-defeating: "get no help!" would be a wiser prescription, perhaps - at least, it worked for me all those years ago). What the lonely person wants is not to be free of those sharp edges, but to find a fit for them. That's very different.
The other day a friend-of-family I was driving home asked me if I feared death. I immediately consigned the outraged response "do I look like someone who fears death?" to the same mental waste paper basket already inhabited by, inter alia, "do I look like a feminist?" and decided on a more considered response. "Well, if you mean being dead, then no, I don't fear that at all. In fact, I rather like the idea: after all, dead people don't have to go to work. But I must admit I'm not too crazy about dying. I've heard, from several extremely reliable sources, that it's quite painful: more so, even, than the toothache which currently afflicts me. So, yeah, I suppose you could say I fear dying, at least." He nodded, and the conversation changed to something more upbeat. What I should have added, though, is this: apart from the actual mechanics of dying, the shooting pains in the shoulder and chest region and all of that, the eruption of panic hormones, there's one little niggling caveat I have, I think I've always had, about being dead. It is this: sometimes I suspect that, when I am dead, there will be something missing in the universe. And I don't mean myself: that would be egotistical. I'm Catholic-educated enough to be aware that selves, as in egos, are featureless, interchangeable and quite boring things: they are that which God wishes you would stop having, and be done with it. Even as an atheist, I can't help thinking God was right about that one. Self is a bore. I think I probably had a bit too much self until around the age of 40, after which I started cutting back, and feeling, in the long run, much better for it. So it ain't that.
What is this thing that I think might be missing when I am dead, then? I wish I knew. This blog, and everything I have ever written elsewhere, is a, to date, failed attempt to answer that question. If only I could isolate what it was to be me, and get it down in writing, then I could die in peace, truly in peace: people could then decide to either reproduce these gobbets of me-ness in their own experience, selectively and at their own risk, or cork them into test-tubes and store them on some windswept moorland Research Facility with a skull and crossbones label as a warning. So, then. Is it the ideas? But mine are so unoriginal, so half-assed, so tentative and underdeveloped. It can't be those. Is it the feelings, then? That seems closer, but not entirely there: my repertoire of feelings strikes me as, if robust, somewhat less than Proustian. Is it the images? Is it this constant interior monolog I have in which, instead of words, I have shadows falling across paths, strange trees, yellowhammers, talkative skies, rain-sodden riverbanks, departing thighs? Doesn't everyone have those? How would one tell? And what does it matter anyway? Why would anyone even want there to be a me anywhere? If someone did, wouldn't they have told me so by now?
Ultimately, the only answer I have ever thought of to that last question is provided by loneliness. The only possible reason for there to continue to be a me would be if somewhere, there was a her to match: the exact proposition that Loneliness, qua faith, insists we accept without evidence. If there was, and they made contact, then sense would be born. The Voynich manuscript would suddenly be readable. Cold fusion would suddenly be commonplace. In fact, the image of an explosion, of a huge release of energy, kind of nails it for me. That's what would happen the day I made enough partial sense about something important for someone to think: yeah. Just yeah. But, going by this morning's outing, that ain't gonna happen anytime soon. Hell, if I can be mistaken for a feminist, of all things (and, get this, someone who makes "generalized sexist statements against males"), then I could be given a bonus 2,000 years of writing time and still not get it down pat. And that, again, is a loneliness maker. My sharp edges must be sharper than I thought.
P.S. 186 visits in 2 days? Odd's Bodikins. I really must remember to be misinterpreted by Canadian YouTube celebrities more often.
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