On Being Alone
Opt-outs for one reason or another led me to cancel the celebration I had planned on the day of my birthday.
We were to do a night hike in the mountains, under the full moon. Everyone was marvelling at the idea a month prior, but as the time drew closer they seemed to see it with different eyes. 'It's a weeknight!' they suddenly realised. Or 'It's going to be really cold!'
I think the problem is that the birthday I was celebrating was my 60th, and many of my vanilla friends are there or thereabouts and, crucially, they 'act their age.' They are not looking to experience new things, or push their limits - they are looking to find the most comfortable groove and inhabit it peacefully. They are settling down into old age.
I'm trying not to be judgemental. These are good, good people. I don't have many friends and those I have really are good people. I have been reminded before that the choice others make to live a vanilla life does not make me 'better' than them in any way. That's important for me to remember. But it has struck me heavily that the gap between us is widening as I explore who I am today.
It first struck me when I got divorced. The assumption from my friends was that I would be angry with my ex, that I would want to talk shit about him. I was not. I did not. We made a decision to open new chapters in our lives. We don't regret that.
There’s an assumption that a person (maybe particularly a woman?) who is 'alone' is a sad thing. So when these good people learnt that I was cancelling the event, some of them called me and offered dinner, or drinks, and said 'Don't be alone'.
Explaining that being alone is not sad, but is in some ways empowering me, is hard to do. It sounds fake. Sounds like I am bravely shouldering the inevitable and putting up a show of being a strong, independent woman because I have to. I know this, because I would have thought the same.
After my divorce I rushed into a relationship, rushed into falling in love, to not be alone. I wanted affection and adoration and, above all, I fell headlong into power exchange and mistook intensity for intimacy. I was gloriously happy.
And then it was over, and I saw that the person I had let myself believe was creating my happiness was actually someone I hardly knew. I had been more alone than I recognised the whole time.
'Being alone' is part of what I explore now.
It is quite possible that I will never have another 'intimate' relationship in the sense of building a knowledge of each other over the passage of time and through various pivotal moments of life. I would like to have that, but it may never arrive. I will not seek it.
There are moments in which I feel lonely, and would like to have someone next to me who knows me, and can make me feel stronger. But even those moments are not sad in an existential sense. They are just moments, from which I learn to feel stronger by myself.
I cherish the growing band of local kinksters with whom I share moments of intensity and affection. I accept that we know each other quite slightly. There are some that I could turn to in moments of personal difficulty, and they to me, but we are not intimately wrapped up in each other’s lives.
Play partners will come and go, and I will enjoy their company while they are here. In fact they did, as I could not explain to my vanilla friends, help me to celebrate my birthday in a joyous exploration of our mutual sexualities. It was intense and memorable for all of us; filled with affection and goodwill.
In the end there is a resonance for 'settling down into old age'. I am seeking to be settled within myself at a base level, while continuing to shock and challenge and push and amaze myself with what my body and mind can experience, for as long as that is possible. That is my version. Not for me the comfortable groove. At least, not yet. But being comfortable with the notion that I am alone? That is valuable.
Being able to be alone and to embrace being alone is important.
Because ultimately, we are.
About the Author: Serenedipity was 57 years old when she discovered her kinky, sex positive self. She continues to look forward, and up, but has never once looked back.
