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During the past few years of my life, I have lived with feelings of intense loneliness. It seems to me that after I moved away from my home state that people were no longer interested in taking time to form genuine relationships. In my new area, I had many friends, but I think that most of them were acquaintance friends because even though these people knew what hobbies I enjoyed, they never really got to know me as a person. It takes too much time to really connect with another human being, and learn what makes him or her angry or sad or what his or her fears and joys are in life. Sadly, I think that this is a commentary on our society today. We are all very connected via e-mail, cell phones, instant messages, and text messages, but I often think that we're so busy being "connected" that we're actually disconnected.

While I am grateful for the technology that provides e-mail and instant messaging, it doesn't begin to compare with the physical presence of another human being. I have many online friends, and I am grateful for them as well, but I probably hold back a little of myself with online friends because the internet is public and I don't want to share details of my personal life with the whole world.

I am also very grateful for long distance phone service because this allows me to call friends who have known me for a long time, and during that time, we both fostered a true friendship where we could be open and honest and not fear being judged by the other person. Once again, I am grateful for these friends, but I would love to have that type of friend locally. My husband and I moved from the previous area and are now in a new area. It is much harder to get out and make friends here because my children are both grown and no longer live at home. In my previous geographical area, I got involved in school activities and met lots of very nice people, but they were all too busy to nurture a deep friendship, which always disappointed me.

Loneliness engulfs me on a daily basis, but I have learned to cope with it. During the long winter days here, I keep busy by sewing, watching television, and spending time on the computer. I am still taking care of my elderly mother, so I check with her by phone every day, and I visit her once a week. This helps me to get out of the house and at least talk to other human beings.
However, this doesn't cure the deep loneliness that I often feel inside.

I am an only child, so I have been used to being alone all my life, but until recent years,
I've never been lonely. As I've thought about this, I find myself longing for simpler times
when there wasn't quite so much hustle and bustle in life; times when entertainment could be
as simple as sitting on the porch on a summer's evening, listening to a baseball game on the
radio, and maybe even having a conversation with the neighbor who was sitting on their own
front porch. Sometimes I miss having a clothesline because many women had wonderful conversations while hanging the laundry. I often wonder if we valued people and relationships
more at that time in our history. Perhaps we were just more connected in a personal way than
we are in today's world, or maybe I'm simply romanticizing earlier memories of my life.

All I really know for sure is that I'm lonely, but I never quite give up hope that one day I'll
meet someone who is willing to take the time to get to know me, and allow me to get to know
her as well, and that a true, genuine, deep friendship will be born. Until that day, I'll
keep myself busy and live each day filled with hope that I will receive the cure for my
loneliness.

Learn more about this author, Belinda Beasley.
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