Issue #12, home alone

Let's Get Lost, May 25, 2024

It’s Wednesday evening and I’m writing this from our back deck. It’s sunny and warm, but not too warm. I am the only one home and aside from the sound of children playing in the campground, the only other noise is bird chirping.

Someone has a campfire going and while the breeze gets a little over excited from time to time and frantically blows my hair into my face, it’s mostly calm and gentle. My dinner is a bowl of sweet potato chips and, because I just finished the photoshoot, the chocolate orange biscotti from the photos in this newsletter and that is just fine with me.

Man I love being home alone.

When people find out we live in an RV, one of the first questions/ comments is something along the lines of, “you two must really like each other”…

And we do. Steve and I spend nearly all our time in the same space. We live and work, day in and day out, in 400 square feet. When we’re not inside, we’re usually out doing something together. We love being on the road, in the truck or on the bike. Living and traveling in close quarters is not generally something we find difficult. It’s how we like it.

But also, I love being home alone.

When the kids were young and our house was whirlwind of chaotic activity, getting a few hours alone at home was like stepping into cool water on a hundred degree day. I would let it wash over me and sink down deep into the quenching relief of silence and space.

I have also been alone in times of profound sadness when the space around me felt heavy, oppressive, and restrictive - more like quicksand then cool, clear water.

Earlier this week, I had a long conversation with a woman who is learning how to be alone without being lonely. Having never lived on my own (my husband and I married straight out of high school and went directly from our parents’ house to our first apartment), I have very little to offer her in the way of shared experience.

But I do know that loneliness isn’t reserved for those who are alone and being alone is sometimes the opposite of being lonely.

Maybe the key is in learning how to use the time to ourselves, however abundant or scarce, to connect to ourself. To think, breath, feel, and act in whatever way we choose because we are the only one in the room.

What do you most want to do when no one is watching? What do you allow yourself when there is only yourself to please?

Does the time fill you in a way that feels as essential to your wellbeing as air? Or does the absence of others suck all the energy from the room and cause you to lose all motivation?Are there demons in the silence that seize the opportunity to take center stage? Is it harder to avoid eye contact with that big fat elephant in the room when there’s no one else to look at? Or, is silence the only way you can think, feel, breath, and make sense or your own experience?

Yes, yes, yes, yes, and yes.

I went to a concert with a friend earlier this week and listened to a man with a harmonica and a guitar sing you can’t go around what you gotta go through and, I mean, obviously. But also, goddamn I needed to hear that.

And also, if you haven’t read it recently or ever, The Journey by Mary Oliver:

“…But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own…”

I’d guess these poets gathered up their insight in moments of silence, and passed them along in the hope that we would have a moment quiet enough to take it in.

For the bakers:

• This month’s bake club challenge is Lemon Bars! 😋AND

• 5 Recipes That Will Change The Way You Bake: Level up your baking game with genius baking tips + recipes

The rest of this newsletter is for paid subscribers and includes:

• The week in photos

• 4 NEW recipes: Cabernet Braised Short Ribs, Chocolate Orange Biscotti, Spicy Harissa Pasta, and British Flapjacks (a granola-bar-like cookie that is my new favorite travel day snack).

• My favorite resources for planning our travel itinerary every year

The week in photos