Tuesday September 27th 2022
Dallas, Texas.
Dear friend,
I hope this letter finds you well and I hope that wherever you are or however you may be feeling, you get to experience a little joy today. Last month, I said I would commit to writing to you once a month for a year, so here it is. As I alluded to in my introduction, the past few months have felt frustrating and slow – my ideas have yet to return from the war and much like a homefront lover, I am left writing letters to get a semblance of it back. I know I will once again inshallah feel the rush of wonder and excitement that comes with developing and thinking about new ideas. Till then, I just have to be patient with myself.
Perhaps you’re in the same boat and miss these feelings of excitement and zeal and you now it feel its absence instead – which unfortunately comes in bouts of boredom and exhaustion. All I can suggest is what I am doing: trying not to be angry with myself, giving myself (& my body) time and taking small steps to bring it back. This letter is one of those small steps – so congratulations, you are playing an integral role in my creative process.
As you may know, I split my time between Rhode Island and Texas (which is a more cultured way of saying I spent time with my parents) but I spent much of this past summer in Rhode Island. Despite living on and off in the state for four years, I have never actually visited a beach in the ocean state, even though there are plenty and yet again another summer was threatening to come and go without me having visited a beach. A big reason I had never visited the beach before is because these things tend to be group activities; you go with your family or a group of friends. I live alone in Rhode Island and I have friends – but not necessarily a friend group per se. You can read more about this in this piece I wrote for Gawker this past summer, the point being that I haven’t really had the opportunity to go to the beach with other people.
Beyond the fact that it is more fun to be around other people, there is a logistical problem with going to the beach alone – specifically if you don’t have a car and that is; where will you put your things when you are in the water? I one day bemoaned this fact on twitter, to which a helpful person pointed out that you can buy waterproof pouches to take with you in the water (another person suggested burying your valuables in the sand). I went with the pouch.
With this new knowledge, I was determined to enjoy at least one day at the beach before the season ended on Labor Day. I ordered the pouch, did a little tissue in water test to make sure it would actually work, double wrapped my phone in a Ziploc bag and bubblewrap to be safe, packed shrimp sandwiches, sunscreen and goggles, and looked for the nearest beach I could reasonably get to via public transit. This looked like taking the 60 Newport bus from downtown Providence to a beach in a nearby town.
On a Thursday morning, I took the day off from work and waited for the bus. A twenty-minute bus ride and a half hour walk through leafy residential streets (some without sidewalks) later – and I was finally at the beach. Finally laid out in the sand with my library copy of The Grapes of Wrath, took a picture for the gram to make it look like I was reading and then off into the water I went, with my valuables packed in my little waterproof pouch (it worked though that didn’t stop me from obsessively checking it throughout the day). And let me tell you, it’s just good to be in the ocean. The water was murky, it was green and the salt water definitely irritated my throat at times – but it is good to be in the ocean. It’s nice to immerse yourself in the abyss, to reach out and grab a small shell that has embedded itself in the sand, to sit in the water and let the oncoming waves rock you back and forth. You can spend hours at the beach in this way.
After getting out of the water, I ate my little sandwiches and attempted to read one page of Steinbeck before deciding that reading at the beach is something people lie about doing. I spent the rest of the afternoon just looking out at the water. I was on my own, but I didn’t feel lonely.
Modern society, especially in this country, pushes people to pursue rugged independence. Make it in life – especially in your job, so that you do not have to rely on anybody. At the same time, the social expectation is that you surround yourself with lots of people socially. The ironic part about this is that we are taught to be independent, but we are never really taught how to be alone. I think that’s why so many people feel lonely in America – when society isn’t really structured around building community, it can be difficult to form connections socially. And when you can’t – even if you are surrounded by people, it feels even more isolating. What am I not doing right?
It is good to be independent, it is bad to be alone. Don’t be alone.
What I’ve realized over the past few months, especially sitting there at the beach is that being alone – especially when you take intentional time to be alone – can be quite nice. I think sometimes we are afraid of being alone because it implies an absence of something and we’re afraid that sadness will fill the void. Sometimes that does happen, especially when we are alone and it is not of our choosing. All you can think about is what and who you don’t have around you.
I remember a few years ago at the University of Toronto when I was a student leader and attending a conference on campus. All the other leaders had gone to the bar to socialize & me being a nondrinker, went to the “dry social” – which consisted of a few board games and absolutely no one showing up. At the time, I had broken my laptop and my phone was one of those flip phones (it was 2013, I was behind the times) and so I really felt alone. That night, the absence I felt turned to sadness and I cried myself to sleep.
It's important to create intentional moments of being alone, especially if you find yourself in a time in life when you are more on your own – perhaps post college, starting a new job in a new city. During these intentional moments – a swim at the beach, a walk in the park, laying out a blanket on a hill – use whatever senses you may have to engage with the world around you. Look, hear and feel and just take it all in (I just invented meditation guys). But you’ll find that the simple pleasures of life will begin to make themselves apparent to you and your senses will attenuate to them. I felt a wash of gratefulness and was happy to be alive that day at the beach.
It might help to pick a time and a day when there are less people in groups – for the beach, I knew that the weekend would be packed and I might feel the absence of other people more strongly seeing others with their friends and family; so I picked a weekday when the only other people there were also locals on their own.
This intentional time to yourself, doing whatever you want – it doesn’t always make the moments of sadness go away when you’re alone. But they do get less frequent.
Life is beautiful and difficult but I’m just happy to be here for the ride. My friend, I hope you are too.
See you on October 27th.
Best,
Abdullah
I am sorry about any typos that appear in these letters. True to the style of a letter, I’m not proofreading or editing these – but I guess that doesn’t really make me that different than most newsletters these days does it?
If you’d like to write me a little note, you can reach me at the following address. I will do my best to write you back.
Abdullah Shihipar
How To Be Alone
PO Box 2457
Providence, Rhode Island
02906