On a beautiful, long beach in northern Ontario, in the dead of winter, with the cold wind rolling off the angry water toward me like a bowling ball gunning down the lane, I look around to see who is there to witness my impending demise; pick up the pieces and call in the cavalry should I topple over.  Blinking back the cold dry air, I pause and realize, there is no one. If I get stuck in the ice, frozen and disoriented, a passerby to rescue me is unlikely and I will simply become a part of the icy blue landscape in whatever sculptural, gnarled position I get caught in; an unusual, and rare piece of glacial driftwood. I’m out here alone.  Me and my coat. Me and my hat. Me and my headphones and podcast. It’s a bitter cold day and the wind is not whispering in my ear, it’s howling like a pack of shrieking she-devils summoning me to the other side. With a self-deprecating laugh at my foolishness, I decide to cut my walk short and head back up to the cottage and live.  ‘Not dying’ is more important than my daily fitness and inspiration walk. I head back to the warmth of the cottage to tell everyone about the winter fury down at the beach and how the wind had some colourful and threatening things to say to me. Inside, boots off, coat hung, I march into the living room and thrust my arms wide to summon my minions and regale them with my story of survival. Then I remember, there is no one here.  I’m still alone and I’m not entirely sure how I feel about that.

I can comb out my hat head - or not. I can leave dirty dishes in the sink between meals - which normally is very challenging for the Virgo in me - or not.  I can put a spot of Fireball in my morning tea mug and leave the bottle in full view on the counter - unashamed and buzzed by 10am - or not. I can laugh a maniacal laugh at the idiot on the local radio station who mispronounces bruschetta.  “Ha ha moron it’s broo-SKEH-tah, not broo-SCHE-tta.”  I am savagely the smartest person in the room. A three day solitary writing retreat to the cottage in the middle of January has always sounded so poetic, indulgent and reminiscent of something a great writer does and should do - and for the first time in my life, I was doing it.  I thought I would feel like Hawthorne or Beckett, completely consumed by creativity, conversing loudly with the voices in my head while enduring my ‘cottage siege”. At the end of it all, I would have the beginnings of my masterpiece and a state of mind that would be fragile yet beautiful.  Time alone. To write. Amazing.

By 11 am of day one, I was drawing more parallels to “Home Alone” than I was to a Hemingwayesque writing binge. In quick succession I felt excitement, then paranoia, and strangely, a bit of loneliness. Inspiration was elusive. Finding more bubbly water and Lindt chocolates in the cupboard excited me more than any story idea I had. It was more likely that I would end up writing about cheese and paper towel than I would about war and peace.

I  assumed I would instantly settle in to this soothing cottage environment, void of distraction and ripe for thought. Sometimes I physically crave time alone and this was the Superbowl of ‘alone’.  The ‘Superbowl of alone’ - just some of the stellar writing that came out of this retreat.  I thought I’d toss it in here so you could get a real taste for my literary gift.

Settle in immediately - I did not.  Crumble under the avalanche of ideas, prose and dialogue that were supposed to rain down on me - I did not.  I was beyond shocked at how much I missed people - eeewww gross, my family - I thought the reprieve from responsibility would be nice, the internet - just for, ya know, stuff like confirming the phonetic pronunciation of bruschetta, and love - I missed being loved.  A hug, someone to kiss hello or good-bye, or to brush past me in the bathroom and say ‘hey’ to. I am not the rough, boorish ball of poisonous spikes I thought I was. Such a disappointment. It’s like I’m a children’s author and didn’t know it. I can already hear the cheerful rhymes about dandelions and water bugs filling the page.

Then a few more hours passed in my retreat.  The unease of not being connected to anyone or anything started to dissipate.  The quiet seemed normal and I was energized by the lack of routine. I might have dinner at... at... how about when I’m hungry!  I turned on music only when I was stoking the fire or eating, otherwise, I really did sit in silence. Despite my joking, I had not a drop of alcohol in those three days. It was more out of wanting to have my wits about me to battle the murderer in the woods than it was an indication of my dedication to work.  A fire poker and frying pan became my new companions and first line of defense against any Wildlings who might dare to come knocking. First - a jab with the poker, then uppercut to the jaw with the pan, throw in a kick to the groin, a spit in the eye and an elbow in the back as I whiz by and out the door to safety! It took surprisingly few rehearsals before I was confident in my moves. I only broke a sweat on the last run-through.

Then a few more hours passed, the icy blue drained from the sky and filled up again with a silky black and surprisingly, I settled in a little more.  I sat quietly and thought about my family. I let myself hear each of their voices isolated in my head, with no background noise, like a recording in a sound booth.  I gave them each something to say, smiled, then let them go. I kissed my dog in my minds eye and softly said, ‘see ya later buddy’. The internet didn’t seem important anymore and I stopped missing it.  In fact, the idea of it felt intrusive. If I were to acknowledge it, it would be like opening the door to a telemarketer during dinner - unwelcome and a waste of my time.

Now I was really alone. When was the last time I was alone?

It was disheartening to me when I realized much of my life I had wasted ‘alone time’ on foolish thoughts that generally bore no fruit.  When I think about my adolescence, I remember spending hours sitting on my bed wrestling with notions self-doubt and criticism. There were countless evenings spent lying on the carpet with magazines yearning for people or things I couldn’t have until I was left with a stomach ache. I stood crying in the bathroom once because there were no models with freckles therefore, I could never be a model or famous.  Because freckles were my problem, not my headgear and giant forehead. In my young adult life, I wasted ‘alone time’ almost entirely on the act of recovery; recovering from the night before, recovering from embarrassment of one kind or another, recovering from a breakup - although I had few relationships even though the headgear was gone. I spent time recovering from long bouts of studying, or time spent agonizing over the future.  Will I or won’t I get this job? Should I live here or there? Thoughts of the future waste an awful lot of the present.

During the early years of my marriage and motherhood, when ‘alone time’ is most fleeting, I spent precious moments between naps worrying about money, my weight, the health of my babies and managing it all without looking like I was a toothpick holding up a train - which is how I felt most of the time.  I remember hearing something about there being no crying in baseball and I was determined there be no crying in my marriage or over my parenting. I was not about to be a card carrying modern woman claiming I can do it all then cry over one little incident of accidentally leaving baby number three at the pharmacy counter while I took the other two outside for a snack.  Pharmacist lady - wherever you are - thank you for not judging me...or calling the police. In those days, my alone time was spent breathing, worrying, and counting my kids.

Now, in my mid-life, I realize I haven’t had any alone time in recent years.  I’ve had to do all my worrying, recovery, and wrestling with self-doubt in plain view while either stirring a pot on the stove, filling a grocery cart, hosting a birthday party or teaching a class.  ‘Alone time’ seems like an impractical luxury, like using a diamond encrusted shovel to pick up dog poop or taking a limousine to a doctor’s appointment. Why? How? ‘Alone time’ seems like it is all in my past and not likely to surface again until my kids and their friends find somewhere else to live because they no longer find it cute to brush past exhausted parents asleep on the couch bearing blue teeth from that ever soothing spot of red wine.  For now, my ‘alone time’ is all in my head, stolen thoughts or moments, while life carries on around me.

Then this retreat became a reality and so did a little ‘alone time’.

By the end of that first day, when I had truly let go of the thoughts that unsettled me, I committed to not wasting this ‘alone time’ on any of the garbage that hijacked my brain before.  With that unwritten contract in place, I couldn’t help but slowly start to enjoy my own company. It’s amazing how much I have in common with myself! Without discussion, the menu was decided; I ate nothing but prosciutto, goat cheese and bagels. I let my hair go greasy and my makeup bag get dusty. I kept slippers and sweats on for 3 days straight but carried myself as though I were in Manolo’s and Prada. During the day, I sipped caffeine drinks, loads of tea and chirped ‘quelle surprise!” when I needed a Benedryl to sleep, or a walk to calm the caffeine jitters. I sang - so cliche but … I sang.  God Bless the soundtrack to A Star Is Born , my pubescent male voice, and the thick curtains that kept the sound in.  I read old magazines and afterward talked to the writers about how I felt about their articles and punctuated my commentary with thoughtful pauses.  I fell asleep watching saccharine slop I downloaded off Netflix on my Ipad and justified my choice to no one. ‘Dumplin’ was a delight, and let me tell you, when times are tough, we should all ask ourselves “What would Dolly do?”, ‘cause if Dolly Parton can’t see a way out, well then honey, nobody can.

By day two I woke up happy to see myself.  I breathed in the quiet and savoured the breakfast that wasn’t really breakfast but more of a party platter.  I tackled the beach again and no longer looked around for someone to engage with or rescue me. The fire poker and frying pan went back where they belonged like toys on a shelf.  I slowly started to play with the characters in my head and we got to know each other like bunk mates at summer camp - between my singing, and building fires. Day three was more of the same; laughing aloud, listening to my ideas and eating like a thief in a brasserie in Paris.  Words, people, places and conversations came alive through my fingers and popped up on my screen. A bit rough, a bit purposeless, but my clunky masterpiece was emerging.

I knew by the end of it all that ‘alone time’ was not what I needed to write my passion piece.  I needed to like being alone.  I needed to like me without the noise that pads my identity everywhere else and keeps me from being free with my thoughts. I have rarely known what it’s like to relate to myself on a playful level except maybe during my toddler years, that are mostly forgotten or discounted. Whether alone or in a crowd, toddlers walk around with crooked pony tails, dirty tee shirts, singing songs to no one in particular, stealing cookies and wrapping themselves in blankets of make-believe that make it perfectly normal for lily pads to be immune to lava.  I needed to go back in time for a play date with myself.

“Once we believe in ourselves, we can risk curiosity, wonder, spontaneous delight, or any experience that reveals the human spirit” - E.E. Cummings

Superman’s fortress of solitude is cold and empty. It’s where he goes to talk to ghosts, seek guidance and find peace.  I like my fortress better. Solitude to me is no longer an endless frozen beach, cold and empty. When I think of solitude now, I feel a mug of tea in my hand, the warmth of a fire by my feet and the freedom to sing “Shallow” with greasy hair and the shakes.   

By Carol Sloan

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