By Natasha Josefowitz, Ph.D.
LA JOLLA, California — The most frequent complaint I hear from widows is that when evening comes and they’re alone in their homes, no matter how interesting, exciting, or awful an event occurred during the day, there is no one to share it with.
If I have seen a good movie or read an interesting article, that event becomes finite, it has no further life. Whereas by discussing it with someone it continues a life of its own. No, it does not work to call a friend, because this is not a one-time happening. It is the dozens of things that happen, a conversation with someone, a walk on the beach, all end with a thud. I miss the continuity of recall—the “remember when…” that is now gone.
The spouse cannot be replaced, but maybe a best friend, a sibling, a grown child, a parent if still alive, can be part of an ongoing conversation that takes place at least once a day, if not more frequently.
Having not had a best friend since my husband was it, nor children in my time zone, I feel very strongly the need to find a kindred spirit. Right now, not only is there no one who knows what I do, where I go, or what I think, no one cares.
On one hand, I am surrounded by friends, on the other, there is no real intimacy with anyone. It is difficult to forge this kind of friendship in one’s later years—without a common background of having known each other for decades. Yet it must be attempted.
Probably I should try to find a widow or widower who is willing to spend time together and talk on the phone when needed, someone with shared interests who can become a real friend. That is my new homework. A friend mentioned going online: “Looking for a friend, male or female, someone to share a meal, go to a movie, take a walk, but mostly to talk on the phone every day about that day’s events, what each had seen, read, experienced.”
This is what most single people living alone miss most: the sharing of one’s daily life. Some of my single women friends form groups to go together to concerts and plays and to travel or play bridge on a regular basis and know about each other’s lives. Some of my friends have grown children they talk to every day or a sibling or someone they grew up or went to school with whom they share a history.
Even though I live in a retirement community, and there are certainly enough single women here, my husband was my best friend and our friends were all couples. I never made the effort to have a single person as a best friend, someone with whom there is real intimacy. This is a common problem.
And what is missing from my life is intimacy. It means being willing to be vulnerable with another person. And vulnerability means not only sharing secrets that if revealed could be harmful, but also becoming known, including all of the embarrassing thoughts, silly fantasies, guilt of past mishaps, pride of accomplishments, disappointments, hopes, and fears: the totality of what makes a human being whole.
Being known, warts and all, and still being accepted and not judged, given honest feedback and being cherished are all ingredients of true friendship, as they were the ingredients of the marriage I’m mourning.
So, to ward off loneliness, one has to be willing to become known as well as to know and accept that other—the trick then is to find a person with whom this can be achieved.
I wrote a poem to express this dilemma.
Conundrums
I can’t allow myself to be known
unless I can trust the man I’m with
I can’t trust him
unless I know him
I can’t know him
until I know how he responds to me
he won’t know how to respond
until he knows me
But
he can’t allow himself to be known
unless he can trust the woman he’s with
he can’t trust me
unless he knows me
he can’t know me
until he knows how I respond to him
I won’t know how to respond
until I know him
But
we can’t allow ourselves to be
known…
*
Josefowitz is based in La Jolla. This article appeared in the La Jolla Village Voice