Someone to talk to

November 15th, 2023

Do you? Well, do you really have that close someone to talk to? That special person, or several, with whom you just know you can talk about everything without being judged? And without expectations of advice — just a person who will listen to you when the going gets tough?

I am so unbelievably lucky that it is beyond being ridiculous. After years, decades really, of trying to drive away everyone who dared to be close to me, I still have several people in my life to whom I can talk whenever I have a need. And I don't need to call them friends (I had good friends in my life with whom I wouldn’t dare to talk about my deep and disturbing issues) — they are also people in my family who I know I can trust completely. I lost several of those people over the years to cancer. I lost several of those people to the simple fact of drifting apart (and me being an insufferable asshole for a big part of my life), but there are still those I can rely on. Sometimes I even wonder if I actually deserve it.

But I do. It is a give-and-take symbiosis — I know now that if I give another person some of my time and my attention when they might need it, a good and tried companionship will respond in kind. It works. Of course, I am not trying to abuse those relationships by being constantly needy. I still try to look at the resolution on my own, but I have no qualms about reaching out to another person to lend me an ear and look at my problems from a different perspective. I still like to be alone most of the time, and I feel fine with it. But I can be alone and not be lonely. Far from it. The decision about the quantity of my interactions is mine and mine only. That is another shocking and, at the same time, a wonderful surprise for me.