Getting Off the Island

         It was the typical Sunday conversation with my mom that got me thinking about it.  She was commenting, as usual, about my lack of a romantic attachment.  “Jamie,” she said, “Your sister is married, and your brother is soon to be engaged any day now.  What about you?  Don’t you want to find somebody?  If you don’t you will be lonely for the rest of your life.”
         We have all been stranded on Lonely Island.  Abandoned and frightened, we try to keep our cool in order to survive.  We make makeshift huts and rub sticks together to try and keep the solitary cold from getting under our skins.  We lie awake at night, jumping every time a disembodied noise breezes our ear.  We stick to the beach, afraid of the wild darkness from the inner recess of Lonely Island.  We set off flares, yell, and wave our arms around like fools as ships continue to pass us by.
         It’s no wonder that songs, movies, and various written texts capitalize on this feeling.  And their answer to loneliness seems to be finding somebody, anybody, and you won’t be lonely anymore.  After all, when we’re on Lonely Island, we take the first ship that comes to rescue us for fear that we will be stuck there forever.  Think of all the Carpenter songs that have been played.  In “Superstar”: “Loneliness I such a sad affair, and I can hardly wait to be with you again”.  Then there are the lyrics in Rainy Days and Mondays”: “Funny but it seems that it’s the only thing to do, run and find the one who loves me”.  Or what about “Solitaire”?  “And solitaire’s the only game in town, and every road that takes him takes him down, and by himself it’s easy to pretend he’ll never love again”.  Even hard rock ballads seem to agree that if you are without somebody, you are a lonely person.  For example, Slaughters “Flight to the Angels”: “And now I drive down this lonely, lonely road; woo I’ve got this feeling I’ve got to let you go cause you got to fly to the angels”.
         Even movies capture loneliness and reiterate the idea that people are lonely because they don’t have someone.  The synopsis for every Romantic comedy is pretty much the same.  Two lonely people are wondering about in this lonely world.  They feel as if they are missing something.  They feel incomplete, alone.  Then fate or serendipity intervenes and they bump into each other.  Suddenly, life has meaning.  Now they will never be lonely, ever again.
         Does being lonely mean being alone?  Does the lonely bug strike only when someone wonders from the pack?  Loneliness isn’t afraid of the crowd.  It doesn’t discriminate.  It will slip in and attack at any moment, regardless of whom else might be there.  It could happen at a football game.  You could be sitting in the crowd, elbow to elbow with hardcore fans, when suddenly it hits you - loneliness.  Or it might happen at a family Thanksgiving dinner.  Dad has just cut the turkey, and your little brother wiggles his olive covered fingers at you.  Then like a snake, you feel it slithering up your leg - loneliness.  You could even be spooning with your newfound love.  Your arms entwined with theirs, feeling their heartbeat with yours, then that familiar tightening in your chest comes and takes over - loneliness.
         What causes this feeling of isolation?  How do we get on Lonely Island?  Sometimes great change can cause loneliness.  Taking on the noise and independent college environment, the college freshman may feel a bit overwhelmed.  Adjusting to the tasteless cafeteria food and attempting to study for finals, while their roommate makes out with someone on the bed, may cause the freshman to face times when the overwhelming change makes them enter the Lonely Island.  Then they go home for Christmas, hoping for the familiar, stable atmosphere of home.  But to their surprise, their parents have turned their room into a game room.  All their childhood toys are sold, and the high school that they once attended is now a church.  They become disconnected, reflective, and lonely.  As humans, we realize that change is constant, yet we are creatures of consistency.  So when our environment suddenly changes, when we lose someone close to us, when we realize that we can’t control our lives completely – we start to reflect on the unforeseeable future.  We realize that we may have to watch loved ones die.  We realize that we will face our own deaths, utterly alone.  This reflection often causes those familiar lonely feelings.
         When we reflect on the past, we may be inviting loneliness to invade.  Perhaps we find ourselves leading a boring life, unlike the life we lead in our past.  We start to bring up old memories of the touchdown that won the game; the play where we were the leading role; the guy or girl that got away.  And as we reflect, we start to yearn for those golden days of yore.  We wish that we could go back and do it all again.  Or we wish we could go back and do it differently, so things would be different for us today.  Then we feel it in our chest, and we take big gulps of air as the feeling moves throughout our body, loneliness.
         We are afraid of Lonely Island.  Sometimes we do irrational, masochistic things to try and get off the island.  We turn to drugs and alcohol, becoming dependent on these inhibitors.  Or we latch on to the first person we can get our hands on, forming a romantic attachment.  And this can be a harmful solution.  Developing a relationship to keep out loneliness is a bad idea.  Countless failed celebrity marriages have showed that it will not work out.  Celebrities jump from marriage to marriage, so they don’t have to be alone.  Scared of discovering whom they really are, they move from one burning kettle into another burning kettle.  In the end, they hurt more than themselves; they hurt those they use as well.  And what if they happen to have a child, while they are in that short relationship.  They, too, suffer from their parents’ fear of loneliness
         What’s wrong with staying on Lonely Island?  There are those who have been stranded on Lonely Island that have created some of the greatest works.  Emily Dickinson, considered one of the loneliest poets, wrote a poem a day.  And Virginia Woolf, a lonely and clinically depressed writer, wrote several monumental works.  Would it be such a bad idea to explore Lonely Island a bit?  If you’re already there, you might as well see the sights.  Take the time to go into the inner jungle on the island.  You might discover a few hidden treasures, while you’re there.  But don’t stay too long because the island has a way of getting to people.