Write Your Own Ticket In A World Full Of People, We’re Pretty Much On Our Own To Overcome Loneliness

I recently read that loneliness has now become the great American disease. It’s easy to believe this, for it’s a disease that no medicines, doctors or even faith can cure. The only possible cure is our own determination to keep a life of some fullness and worth; to be adamant that loneliness will not take over and leave us with desolate days and years.

Most of us who are not young have learned that it’s dangerous to let life just “happen.” If we don’t control our own lives, we’ll inevitably be lonely. If we want our lives to be as full as possible, we alone must make them so.

One of the easiest ways to have love and companionship is to adopt a pet. Tenderness and affection given to a pet are invariably - and wonderfully - returned. Having an animal as a companion is clearly not enough, but it can be the first positive step against loneliness.

Here are more ways to keep from being overcome by loneliness. Some I’ve found by myself; others, friends have shared with me.

An 80-year-old widower I know consistently buys tickets in advance for professional performances which come to Spokane. He told me that ahead of time, he usually wishes he hadn’t bought the tickets. But later, after he’s been to the performance, he’s always glad that he did. Glad that, for a while, he was a part of the brighter outside world.

And I know an older married woman who believes it’s important to get out of the house at least once a day. By herself. She says if she can’t think of anything else she wants to do, she strolls through fabric stores. The important thing, she says, is just to do it. Apathy and loneliness can too easily be partners.

When you’re feeling lonely, go to the library, go for a walk, go to church. Play golf, bridge or mah-jongg, or do things you’ve never done before. I’ve thought about taking watercolor classes. Whether I do it, it feels good to have a few “maybes” in my future. It gives hope. I admire one friend, who is in her late 50s and has a busy life, but is taking piano lessons for the very first time. And she’s excited about it!

Because I like anything to do with words and books, I’ve found two ways to spend my time which give me a lot of pleasure. The fact that they both help others is incidental. I’m glad that they do, but, frankly, I do them because they keep me from being alone. And because, by doing them, I keep making new friends. One of these things is tutoring 12-year-old boys.

I’m not a trained instructor and I’m sure others could do it more efficiently. But I do have a lot to offer these boys: maturity, caring, companionship, laughter and my ability to talk to them as I do to adults.

The other thing I do during the school year is to read, once a week, to first-graders at All Saints School. It’s the most fun thing I do, with no exceptions. I’ve never laughed as much in my entire life as I have when I’m with these little children. Or felt so rewarded. Before I go, I often think I’d rather stay home. Rather read. Rather nap. But when I get there, and 20 little children rush out, excitedly yelling, “Jane! Jane!” I can’t think of any place I’d rather be.

I laugh just thinking about the day when I told them about a man I know who lives high up on a mountain in a cabin with no electricity and no running water. I told them that he wasn’t married because, often, women are not attracted to such a life. One little boy said, “Why don’t you marry him?” I told him that I couldn’t do that because I was so much older than the man. He was silent for a few seconds. Then he looked inspired. “Well, just wait two or three years and he’ll be older!” Memories of times of laughter like these stay with me, and loneliness dims.

I’ve also started working as a volunteer in the gift shop at Sacred Heart Medical Center. For years, friends have told me how satisfying it is to be a volunteer in a hospital, but I think they understated it. It’s more than satisfying, it’s fun. I like listening to people who need someone to talk to and helping people find what they want to buy. I like getting out of the quiet of the house and into the world of busy people. But maybe most of all, I like knowing that when I’m there, in all sorts of infinitesimal ways, I’m needed.

So, no matter if one drives, takes the bus, or likes to walk, there are so many things we can do to help us be active and involved. To keep our lives from being solitary ones. They also achieve something extremely important: They get us away from the television sets. We do, instead of watching others do. We live, instead of watching others live. We stop being passive, solitary voyeurs.

T.S. Eliot wrote this about television: “It is a medium of entertainment which permits millions of people to laugh at the same joke and still remain lonesome.”

It’s good to know that a certain kind of loneliness is a given in each of our lives. I learned this rather late, when I told a wise male friend that I was worried one of my good friends was lonely. He said, “Well, she probably is. You are, aren’t you?” I nodded. Then he said, “So am I. Everyone is lonely sometimes.” He had a busy social life, so I knew he wasn’t talking about lonely lifestyles. He was talking about the other kind of loneliness, the kind deep inside each of us. It’s neither good nor bad. It just is.

This kind of loneliness we can make friends with, we can know it’s the “I” which is deep inside each of us. It’s the other kind of loneliness which we must guard against; must diligently work to keep it from invading us - or worse - permanently conquering us.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Staff illustration by Molly Quinn

MEMO: Jane Lavagetto is a Spokane-based freelance writer.