I love those times. I always loved being alone. I also eat whatever odd thing I want, and sort of expand into the space. My husband asks the same question.....

Me, too. I totally get this!

Wow. Great Question. It's better ti abide in the attic in peace than sit in the same hut with a cranky quarrelsome partner. I did the rush to the attic,
cellar.
wine-
racks,
storage,
wood shop,
Mead stock.
`
In the dessert there is no sound.
In the dessert there is no sound.
In the dessert there is no sound.
`
Then, I built a three-story shack.
I built that for`Place of Solitude.
She loved the Place and remains.
`
At least I can say`We get along.
But, that's because` We no talk.
I'd rather go to a `Red Neck Bar.

I go with gals`Ain't John H. cute!
I yell that when `We eat Fat cake!
No eat `Lean Cuisine! Eat chubby!
Chubby Whoa! Whooping! Wows!
I love how you are Honest! Dream!
Daydream. Smart. Bright Wobbles!
Sing nocturnal Wow Whippoorwill!
If Ya visit in Maryland's 'sticks' huh?

No write graffiti in farm outhouses.
You a genius in a Outhouse Playing.
Ya teach farmer 3D chess and ipod.
I can't figure out a- PC or a jail cell.

If you visit I'll introduce Ya to cops.
Hi cop. John H. wants to cop Ya pot.
Joan H. wants a cop to plant the pot.
tease?
Wild day.
Hi monk.
Ya nun too.
Me no none.
Me lonely too.
Monk & Nuns.
Monk no do it!
Monk hum blues.
Monk blow his nose.
Farmer sound a- honk.
Musical hick in sticks honk.
Hi. I'll honk in C- minor cup.
You know. Save Charm tissue.
You need a champagne bucket.
Steal one from the Sheraton Inn.
You make fun with puppy chew toy.
You'd be a Playful Riot wherever.
Good Morning. I love both. wild.

"Blissful sweet silence". What I must have every now and then for my sanity...and a pint of Starbuck's Coffee Ice Cream.

Add music to this and it could be the National Anthem of Mothers. Those moments, so rare and so fleeting, used to bathe me in liberty.
You captured it beautifully, Joan.
Lezlie

This husband doesn't ask that question. This husband feels the same way. I love my family, but I love moments of solitude too.

My husband and I were literally inseparable for the first five years of marriage. Now I appreciate the breathing room of which you speak, coffee ice cream and all. Nice piece, Joan.

Well said. I'm surprised your husband doesn't feel the same way, really.

Being alone, sigh, this last week three days in a row my boys were gone to friends house's until after dark. Not a question, no one standing in my room, sitting on my bed, bored, or just wanting to talk. It was so very nice and peaceful and I just shut everything down to quiet and it was nice.
When they move out I am sure I will back here whining that I am lonely, but these few days, I so get what you are saying...

If you didn't have those wonderful moments of solitude you A. wouldn't be able the recharge your writing muse and B. wouldn't appreciate the moments as much when you are elbow to elbow with your loved ones enjoying the chaos.

We all need it, but many fear it--the being alone. I've got probably way too much of it! Well-described, Joan. I see your POV clearly. If it's Haagan-Dazs, whenever you wanna share :) (r)

P.S. Like Art, every Place of Solitude I create is populated by someone else eventually.

Count me in for the breathing room. Actually I need more than a room, I need a whole breathing house. I crave alone time, and my husband is actually very very good about giving it because he likes alone time too. We've actually learned to be congenially alone in the same spaces -- but that isn't the same as feeling its okay to eat coffee ice cream for dinner! (Though I did have a dream last week where I was at a hotel. It appeared to be abandoned and I wandered the halls for hours -- until my legs ached, even in my sleep -- looking for someone, anyone, and in my dream I thought, "How could I have ever thought I wanted to be alone?" Isn't that a creepy dream? I hope my desire for aloneness never becomes loneliness.)

I'm so lucky . . . my wife doesn't ask "why" . . . she's the same way! But I treasure the quiet, doing what I want to do, watching or not watching what feels good to me, without wondering if it's impacting anyone else.

Oh, lordy, me, too! I'm in my cave at this very moment. My wife is at work, trying to teach English to gibberish-speaking sixth graders, and our daughter is in one of her high school classes, where even the teachers don't write cursive anymore. I catch hell occasionally for being in my cave - undoubtedly more often than is healthy - but I haven't the heart to say, when they're both home and dinner is done, "Dear, I'd go stark raving mad if I sat in the living room for more than five minutes with you sweet things watching American Idol or America's Next Top Model and all the never-ending ads and Hollywood gossip and shrieking news "updates" and god awmighty what else. Yea, verily, stark raving mad!" (r)

I completely get this. Thanks for putting it into words. Well done. Coffee Ice Cream, yum. Rated.

Breathing room! I so understand!

Too relateable for comfort and terrificially written, as usual. I also am always the one who wants the space, while others seem put out by it. Loved reading this but wanted more.

Bell: Most dreams are creepy. Your dream was at least interesting to read- which is a rare thing. I woke up today with the nuttiest dream but telling a dream in a way interesting to anyone else always seems like the biggest challenge

Oh yes... I had one of these last weeks and it felt as tho a small miracle was being handed to me. I cherished every moment!

I so get this. Sometimes I think I might have made a good monk. One that has a few pints of Cherry Garcia in the freezer.

Having just gotten back from a 10 day road trip with the 5 of us in a mini van, your evening sounds like heaven. Maybe I'll just sneak into the bathroom with some of that coffee ice cream!

Annie, I'm glad you can relate.

ranting boomer, I'm glad you get this too!

Art, how I love this comment/poem. I would love a three-story shack of my own. Oh, I would dance and daydream into the night...

Fay, yes, silence and Starbucks coffee ice cream. Bliss.

Lezlie, and perhaps the anthem for wives as well.

Cranky, yes, yes, I adore my family. But it's the solitude the soul craves...

Kathy, thank you. I totally get that.

AHP, the husband does not have this need. I don't understand it myself.

Ll2, yes, it is different when everyone is gone. This is just a temporary respite which feels so lovely, doesn't it?

Joan,
I feel you on needing one's space from time to time and also agree that a steady diet of solitude for me is not all that good...I had a conversation with a friend of mine about this recently. Much love to you.

It's probably already been said since I'm just coming on this one now, but indeed, there is peace in solitude

"Tonight I feel just like the girl in the studio apartment"

he may not get it, Joan... but boy do I.

yep, i'm right. people coming out of the woodwork: "me, too. me, too." my husband has what we call "the bunker," and for him it's enough to be in there all day and emerge at night (to eat the dinner i cook). for me, it doesn't count unless it's the whole echoing house at least overnight, and two nights is better.

love the tags, greta.

I SO get this -- I always look forward to my husband's trips into town or his twice weekly Tae Kwon Do classes because as soon as he's out of the driveway my "blissful" alone time begins. As you wisely add, "I would not want a steady diet of [solitude]." But it is good as a treat, like your coffee ice cream. Definitely "breathing room." Aaahhhh...

Oh how I miss my first studio apartment sometimes too- that tiny little hotbox closet. Ahhh- freedom!

Have you tried Bunk Beds?


{[R]}

There are some days when the company of animals (both domestic and wild), is really all I need.

Breathing room is sacred and even small doses can have a tremendous effect, making us more pleasant for the times the air is indeed, thick. This was wonderful to read and you captured it so well.

Everyone needs silence and time to reflect. Coffee ice cream always helps...

You have said this so perfectly. Solitude is essential for regeneration, and for remembering who we are.

blissful sweet silence is sometimes a welcomed friend.

Can I have dinner at your place tonight?

Ah yes, the breathing room.
Is this why I've had to take my inhaler lately ??

I might be addicted to solitude. Please don't send an interventionist.

Virginia Woolf, from To The Lighthouse:

And that was what she often felt the need of - to think; well, not even to think. To be silent; to be alone. All the being and the doing, expansive, glittering, vocal, evaporated; and one shrunk, with a sense of solemnity, to being oneself.... When life sank down for a moment, the range of experience seemed limitless.

My husband loves his silence, even if its punctuated by salsa music or a police series on the t.v.
After 10, every night, when the girls have gone to bed and the teenaged boy is not sleeping yet but listening to his own angst, quietly (thankfully), I savor what comes close to being alone. I read, I write. Everyone is in the house, everyone is safe. I am irrationally satisfied.

"I have learned that solitude is welcome when it is voluntary. I would not want a steady diet of it or coffee ice cream."
says it perfectly, Joan! Hope you feel recharged.

Your husband is an extravert. You are not. You are recharging and getting new energy. If he doesn't understand that, you need to help him understand.

Joan,
Cool article.
Does your husband blanch at your need for (or fondness of) alone-time because he adores you so or because it is hard for him to be alone?
I look forward to my wife's alone-time, would be happy to grant her more of it. And though I am a man who loves his family (a wife and three kids)...I find that living alone offers (offered) a grace, dignity and rhythm that is vastly underrated.

A breathing room of her own....xox

a little solace, a little refuge, is a dear and healthy thing

YES! After raising 3 kids and then getting divorced. This is the peace I've been longing for. I've got to stay away from the coffee ice cream, though.

I used to have one night a week and I treasured it. Now I have them all...this might be too much, but still too early to tell.

R

Nicely done, Joan, as usual. Boy do I relate. Sometimes I feel I could be your big sister --so many shared feelings.
My "brand" for years has been "solo woman," and I have written and spoken about the joys of solitude countless times. Some people get it and some don't. The man I am now with knows this and I am now convinced he will allow precious solitude. Otherwise I couldn't be with him.

This is just too damn silly. Funny.
My side ribs hurt. I hate BBQ ribs.
I vow to never ever follow Trilogy.
Trilogy use breakable plastic spoon.
I hope Joan H. don't eat pork-rinds.
Senility creep up slowly. Ask vegans.
Vegans get thirty to join PETA ribs.
huh?
I mean I hear they eat thirty BBQs.
They become thirty and eat wings.
They eat turkey wings and breast.
They beat bongoes with hen wing.
That's my foe do. I love lone too.
wow. loneliness vs. loving alone.
thoughts are hid in rich comment.
Gold.

we all need it, but so few seem willing to admit it. i do cherish the evenings and rare days where I have the house all to myself.

"Solitude is welcome when it is voluntary" My favorite line. Lovely.Well said.-r

"solitude is welcome when it is voluntary"
exactly! With no asking anything from you for a little while, you come back a better person. r.

Nicely said, thank you. I have learned to love the quiet times when all I here is the gentle chatter in my head and even that gets a little softer when no one else is around. Ahhh

Sorry. The word is "hear". Excuse me, please. Bit of a newbie HERE.

Nothing makes you appreciate others more than a little solitude...and vice versa :)

Oh yes. All of it. Down to the coffee ice cream.

I just love reading your words!

When ever I read something like this I ask myself, "What is it like to be well?"
Sometimes I feel angry with the situation, sometimes I feel hopeless, and sometimes I feel that there is nothing to do but go on, as I always have.

I am never alone.

It is very hard to keep from breaking the promise I made to myself when I started participating here.

For you, for your ability to be alone, to be well, to be aware of who you are without any doubt, I say Namaste, and bless you. Delight in that mental state. Not everyone has that capability.

"it's oh so quiet, husssh, husssh" bjork
isn't it wonderful?

The balance between being alone and being lonely is one of serene chaos.
Joan, there is such a peaceful flow to your words that always aligns your whitewater and eddies.

Linnnn, exactly. It's all about the recharging and renewing.
dirndl, when you come over I will be sure it's Haagan Dazs.
Bell, dreams of abandonment are the most scary. I too would hope my desire for aloneness would never turn into loneliness.
Owl, you are very lucky. When one person is not wired this way, there are misunderstandings.
ClarkK, my husband leaves when my daughter and I watch those kind of shows too. I covet your cave, btw.
Elisa, maybe they are aliens. Never thought of that.
Sheila, thanks for reading and commenting.
ann1liese, glad you understand.
Fernsy, the ones who don't need space are the ones who are put out about it.
mypsyche, so glad you had some of that.
greenheron, a monk with a freezer full of Cherry Garcia. Sign me up.
mamoore, you are Mother Theresa, dear heart. You deserve a gallon of ice cream in some secluded place.
Jill, I really think there's got to be a balance.

I feel the same way.

I really enjoy my alone time. I figure, it's my soap and my water so I'll wash it all I want.

I love those times too, but the dogs always seem to be on sentry duty and growl and bark into the darkness around 2 am.

You are truly lucky. I think all of us introverts or sometime introverts need that breathing space. In my life it's non-stop symbiosos punctuated by long solitude. In a funny way, it's the same feeling. I love being quiet and alone. I love being all mixed up with another. I can't seem to do both at once and that's why I say, Lucky! Beautifully done and obviously each in her/his way all relate. r

Yep. This is why, in my relationship of four years, my boyfriend and I still live apart. If we lived together, we wouldn't be together.

Your greta garbo tag was not lost on this lady!

We dogs play while the adults are away, catch up on the reading, play a little Bach, there's a little lone wolf in all of us

I would die if I didn't have time alone. Or coffee ice cream when I wanted it. Or both. At the same time. I understand this.

Joan, this is beautiful. It is such a pleasure to read your writing. I love the lean economy of it.
You described this breathing room perfectly.
I love this, "a breeze moves through the room". So much said in just those few perfectly chosen words. Being alone, such a freedom. Especially when you're so used to love clamoring at you.

placebo, indeed there is. Thanks for reading.
Amanda, thanks, Darlin'
femme forte, I like the image of the whole house echoing!Thanks for noticing my tags...
suzie, a good treat, yes!
JustJuli, A tiny box of freedom. Well put.
Larry, I'm terrified of bunk beds.

Breathing room is why I didn't get married. Great posts! Sorry I haven't been reading your blog. HUGE oversight on my part! R

Oh boy, I can't even tell you how much I relate to this one--the longing for solitude and ice cream for dinner. rated!

I am with you 100% on this, Joan. I love my husband - dearly - but ohhhhh how I enjoy my solitude whenever it happens. I'm never lonely, never bored. Pickles and cheddar cheese. Yogurt. Nachos at 3 a.m. Coffee ice cream ... why didn't I think of that???!!!

Are you afraid of being on top or on the bottom?

I love spending time alone.I feel sorry for those who don't feel comfortable in their own company.I love the best of both worlds.And breathing room .....yesssss.

@Larry, I have to jump ahead of my other responses to answer your very important question.
Both, of course. Either I fall off the top bunk and crush my little bones, OR the person on the top falls through to the bottom and crushes my little bones. Bunk beds are a lose/lose situation.

I completey understand. Breathing room.

I feel absolutely the same way!

Hi Joan-You hit a home run with this post. O thank God for the breathing room!
R

What about hammocks? Are they deathtraps too?

Joan,

Your words take me to the quiet place. I, like you, require it now. Having a spot that is just for me is a requirement now for a quality life. A friend of mine just turned 40 and for her birthday her husband rented her a studio office on a side street downtown. It has tall windows for which he selected white, billowy curtains. He furnished it with a chair that turns into a sleeping quarter, and a desk that folds almost to a suitcase. He gave her the one and only key. She took me to her sanity spot last week and we walked the square for a coffee and then a browse in a paperback exchange. I understood about her space, and told her so. I added that it seems she married the right man.

nice... solitude looks good on you Joan. I love it quite often myself. xoxo

There is definitely not enough breathing room in life. I, too, need A LOT of it...and in balance with the rest of life. I love spaciousness and silence...and the spaciousness of silence. Glad you got to enjoy it...and the coffee ice cream...tonight!

I crave solitude! Seldom do I get it. I should have been a hermit.