Loneliness


Loneliness wears many faces. There is the sad, lonely face of a six-year old shut out of the playground fun. The teen, alone in his bedroom looking at his wretched, pus-filled acne in the mirror, and the old man, alone and fragile, on a park bench feeding the pigeons because he has no one else to talk to.


Loneliness knows no racial barriers. Teens in the United States are often alone in the middle of a crowd. In China and Japan, teens commit suicide because they suffer shame if they are not the first academically in their classes as coming in second doesn’t count. The Taliban in the Middle East is filled with young men that are disillusioned by years of war and poverty in the their countries. They, lonely indeed, have nothing to lose, so they grasp tightly to the Taliban who tells them that they are special and that their way of life, culture and religion will return them to their rightful place in their societies. The rhetoric sounds hauntingly familiar, similar to Hitler’s promise to the German people before the Third Reich.


In American culture, the cowboy is the poster-child for loneliness. Alone, out on the range, driving cows to slaughter-houses, suffering through the prairie-life, day after day. Eating alone under the stars, playing a guitar or singing alone to fend off the cold and lingering smallness of life. The life of the iconic American cowboy represents a solitary life, filled with the time and space necessary for quiet, soul-searching deep introspection.


In John Steinbeck’s novella, “Of Mice and Men”, set during the Great Depression, the characters of George and Lennie dream of someday owning their own farm and raising rabbits. The farm represents individual freedom. The rabbits literally represent something soft and warm, but symbolically represent a warm, safe, soft environment, safe from the harshness of real life. The lives of Lennie and George, migrant workers moving from place to place, are similar to the lives of true-life migrant workers today. Constantly on the move from place to place with little to show for grueling work. Lennie and George long for a sense of belonging, a sense of permanence and acceptance. George and Lennie’s dream of making a new start in a better place is ruined when Lennie protects George from a beating by Curley, the bosses’ son. All through the story, George protects the physically-strong, but mentally disabled Lennie from harm. Their dream is killed by loneliness. George and Lennie are both loners, but accept each other as a friend to fill empty lives. Curley is the son of a wealthy farmer, but he is lonely in his marriage because his wife is fixated on herself and does not really love him. Curley’s wife is a beautiful, lonely farm-wife who hates her life, and flirts with anyone who will pay attention which, in turn, causes her own death and ultimately Lennie’s death.


It is a very difficult premise to state that at one time or another, every person in the world is touched by personal loneliness. Race, religion, and politics don’t matter. Live-style doesn’t matter. As human beings, we fear loneliness more than death.