Sad and Lonely

I used to be all for living alone. In my late teens and twenties it was by far my preferred mode of habitation.

I had a sparsely furnished one-bedroom apartment in Hollywood during the early 80s where I wrote unproduced film scripts and bad poetry while standing up at the IBM selectric typewriter I kept perched on my $39.95 Aaron Brothers drafting table.

When I moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico in ’84, I lived in a furnished guest house by myself for a year before moving into a small apartment whose tables and chairs I bought in one afternoon at the local food and drug superstore.

What I enjoyed best about solitary living was the way everything would always be just as I left it when I went out and came home (except on the days the cleaning lady would come, but then it was even better) and how I could eat whatever I want, whenever I wanted, usually standing over the sink.

The comedian Larry Miller used to do a bit about living alone and how strange ideas would start to seem normal, like, “Hmm…I wonder how I’d look if I shaved my entire body,” and while it never quite came to that for me, it was interesting to see which of the social norms and niceties you’d be apt to abandon when no one was around to see; the bathroom door, for instance, becomes fairly redundant, as does washing out one’s coffee cup after each use.

Good times.

But now, I’m having a little taste of the solo life with Mimi and Jen gone ahead to the Midwest since Saturday, and I’ll be damned if it isn’t all sad and lonesome at home alone. Sure, it’s nice that the only pair of shoes I ever have to pick up are my own, but I miss the pitter-patter of their owners’ feet way more.

Eating over the sink is still cool, but just not enough.