Aging Alone versus Aging ALONE: Only one perspective counts

Aging alone holds a dilemma. Actually, it holds many. Today, though, I want to talk about just one – the alone versus ALONE dilemma.

I am a woman aging alone.  Yet, what does that mean?

How many ways can I see myself in “Alone” without being limited by it?

What am I saying about myself when I use such a word as “Alone” to define me?

Does such a word expand my sense of who I am? Or, does it contract . . Does it shrink-wrap the ways I choose to define myself until little but the word remains?

Alone!

Alone. A simple, yet thoroughly charged word in my picture of the world. Perhaps yours as well.

Alone.

One.

Lone.

“A”.

Singular.

Single.

Solitary.

Solo.

Only.

Solitude.

Alone. Just a word. Just a word loaded with all the fear and simplicity my heart interprets as real.

Yet, Fear and Simplicity are counter-intuitive. They live at opposite edges of thought.

What, then?

Alone!

I spend a great deal of my time alone. I work alone. I live alone – aside from the critters who share my home and my life . . and the friends and family who keep that life warmly turning.

I don’t hold the fact of being alone in contempt. Nor do I bow down to any of its greater subconscious implications. It is simply what it is.

Typically, my alone time is time spent with work or in quieter, more contemplative efforts. Inside or out, it tends to be a very comfortable place for me – perhaps a bit too comfortable for most.

I am a woman aging alone . . without spouse, adult children, aging parents . . on my terms . . by myself . . with only the outside influences I seek or request (and a few imposed from “above” that I do my best to tolerate).

Friends and colleagues are welcome in my world, though they enter through their own doors of physical and emotional experience.

Eventually, many will settle here with me, but not till they’re ready. Not till they, too, are alone . . of and by themselves, alone.

Yes, I am a woman aging alone.

Alone!

More than just the physical state of alone, though, I am a woman aging ALONE.

I am a woman aging from the inside-out – aging in an “ALONE” of my own creation . . The kind of aging we are all called to do . . each of us by ourselves . . ALONE.

It’s the kind of aging that depends on the sorting out from among all the outside influences in our lives the one true voice that is our own ALONE.

Am I doing it right? Who’s to say? And maybe that’s the grace of it. Who else is to judge how I conceive of the ALONE I choose to wear . . the ALONE I choose to put on and take off as each day weaves itself into the next?

Who else, indeed! But then, aging isn’t a contest. Or, is it? And if so, against whom is my ALONE-NESS being judged?

Then again, who would dare to judge?! They’re just as ALONE and naked as I in the aging they choose for themselves!

Yes, I am a woman aging ALONE.

Alone!

I carry with me everything it means to me to be “alone”. Even more I carry with me everything it means to me to move through my days – into and through my aging – as a woman whole unto myself . . ALONE.

That’s the tough side of “ALONE”. It’s always changing, as I am always changing. Without so much as my tacit recognition, it weaves itself into and through each choice I make . . each glance I share with a pebble on the roadside.

I am a woman aging in the footlights of alone. If I wanted center stage, it could be mine. That’s not what I seek any more. That was of a different time . . a time long gone . . a time when ALONE hadn’t yet matched its voice to mine.

At this point, I’m quite happy dancing in the twilight with a roadside pebble . . smiling at the quiet power we share . . together . . alone.

. . . . . . . . . . .

How do you define yourself in the context of “alone” and “aging alone”? Is a definition with which you’re comfortable? If not, what’s getting in the way for you?

How do you choose to dance with “alone”, and is it cooperating with your steps and tempo? If not, do you wonder if – just maybe – it’s time to learn a new two-step . . one that makes room in your dance for something less that’s incredibly more?

Please, share your thoughts and experiences of the dance that is your life’s second half . . and of the “alone” with which you may be sharing that dance. I look forward to hearing from you.

Keep growing my friend,
Gail

Tagged as: Aging, Aging Alone, alone