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HomeMy WebLinkAboutWingham Advance-Times, 1977-08-31, Page 5Nurery SCHOOL Registration for the Wingham Co -Operative Nursery School will be held Wednesday, Sept. 7, at the Nursery School on Josephine St. from 9 - 11:30 and 1 - 3:30 p.m. Ages 2 to 5. There will be a drop-in centre with a limited number of spaces available. Please register your child if you intend to use this service'. , during the next year. FOR MORE INFORMATION CALL 357-2424 , Repairs and Rewinds to ALL makes of motors. Brand Names which we sell and service: DOERR: PRESTOLITE: G.E.: BROOK: FRANKLIN: EMMERSON: !Cali 357-2450 i By L uanne N. Ballagh Color them I�nel The silent room ... the feeling of isolation . , . Nobody to talk to . Nobody to care. For many it is a cold empty world. It is close to eight o'clock on a warm summer evening. People are coming and going through the hospital. They have a brief 30 minutes to visit with friends and relatives so they are making the most of every minute. A man walks through the front door and moves to the recep- tionist's desk. And his request is an unusual one: "I'd like to visit the loneliest peraon in the hos pital." Loneliness is one of the most common tragedies of today's so- ciety. Everyone is so busy with his or her own life. They have no time for others. The request made by the hospital visitor came from a heart that had ex- perienced loneliness — that terri- fying feeling that no one cares what happens to you, that feeling BURKE-McLEOD ELECTRIC LTD. p.m Monday -Friday i j BELLE'S ,_. ,..„ FI ,,, VARIITY and GIFT 4 THE CONVENIENCE STORE All Flavours Josephine Street Wingham, Ontario NEILSON'S Famous ICE CREAM $1 69 2 Litre Regular $225 Stock up now for those after school snacks. Mountain Dew 26 oz. Bottle..._,,, •19 plus deposit NEW from Michelle Ear Rings $29td#300 With Hypo -Allergenic Surgical Steel Earwires. STERLING SILVER NECKLACE WITH INITIAL r•, that life is not worth living it it must be lived alone. - Everyone has experienced this feeling at one time �r another. Someone may have shared a close relationship with sotlrteone and known the joys of lave and to- getherness, then suddenly that person is no longer there. It may be a "left -out" feeling because that relationship has never been experienced. It may'. be long nights spent alone ' because, friends are busy with -their oe activities and seem to have no time .for the needs, of others. But very often.loneliues$ IS a feeling of insecurity and alone- ness that places a barrier het - ween one person and others. This feeling can•exist in a small empty smoke-filled room or a hall crowded with busy, noisy people. It is as prevalent among teen- agers as middle-aged.persons. It drives people' to pills . . . to mental hospitals ... to suicide. Loneliness very soften turns people into hypochondriacs, imagining that they have ill- nesses that they do' not, because they feel this is one way they can find a sympathetic ear. Lone- liness can also . be the stem of many physical illnesses, real, as' well as imaginary. It can drive a person 'to excessive eating and cause obesity; it is one of the basic causes of alcoholism, depression and anxiety. It can affect the mind to .such an extent that it can indirectly be the un- derlying factor in many health problems, social hangups and personal insecurities. MANY DIFFERENT KINDS Loneliness affects many dif- ferent people in many different ways. It can turn a child inward until he becomes unreachable, unteachable and unapproach- able. He is always. "on the out- side", never a part of the fun shared by normal children. It can also make a child overly ag- gressive until he becomes defiant with his parents, domineering COCA-COLA 24/10 oz. Cans $495 per case NEW 1978 MODELS Cars.... Trucks Boats . . Etc. NSW IN STOCK GOOD STOCK OFSCHOOL SUPPLIES NOW IN with his playmates. He will st at nothing to get the attention so desperately craves. Ve often, this loneliness is caused the lack of loving discipline a guidance in the home. To the teenager, loneline very often stems from a feeli he is not accepted by his pee He often retreat: into a fanta world where- he is luted a A. re hl• hri, - 111 1 op thought of i1 as loneliness as he much as just "having the . world ry pass by when there should be so by much to be happy about". Christ- nd mas office parties make her feel different so she stays home or ss visits friends. It is for her the ng most difficult time of the year. rs. The aged face a different kind sy of loneliness — a loss of inde- nd pendence, a panicky feeling that they don't have enough money to get along Deteriorating health, loss of hearing and sight, have al - 1 ady isolated them from the out- side world. Their children devote their time to their own lives, their friends are dying or ill, nothing in the world seems as it was in "the good old days". They worry about becoming a burden, they fight to keep their homes, and they remember when life was good and they shared so much with family and friends. Now, few people have time for the old and they are left with their memories. The agonizing lone- s.,pswhich g he t of tieing popular, �.vf.' i ,r all the wrong reaso,. can drive a teenager to a , marriage. It can mean the rirf ference between success a in failure in school grades. It c, make him belligerent and result in trouble with the law., Coping with the teen years is very often difficult and the teenager feels he is alone, unable to communicate with others, in a society that generally knocks 'kids', the way they dress, wear their hair, talk, act and think. DEATH OFTEN A CAUSE Indescribable loneliness is suffered 'when death claims a partner and one is left alone. One widow says, "When you and your mate do everything together. you feel really alone. You don't want sympathy and you don't want to be a burden on others." She de- clined many invitations because she didn't want to be a 'fifth wheel'. She overcame her lone- liness by keeping busy and get- ting more involved with others. She added to her circle of friends and her friends helped her adjust to her new life of aloneness. For many it is not even ' that easy, for they have been too dependent on their mates. Some men or women tend to let their spouses make all the decisions, conduct all the family business. They live. literally. as one, shar- ing the same friends, the same likes and dislikes, doing things together, working arid playing as a unit. When one is left alone, that one is only a half. There is a feel- ing of helplessness, a lost feeling that all support is gone •and life becomes.a struggle. The one who is left is a -misfit among their` former friends, all couples. Things they 'did together hold no interestfor one. And it becomes a cold uncaring world. OTHER CIRCUMSTANCES Ellen ewes, .reeen ,y • divorced from her husband and for her, loneliness is only one more prob- lenz.to face.' For her thelre was a feeling of humiliation after the separation, a feeling of regret that "maybe if I had tried har- der".. Her two children help fill the void but to Ellen there is'no replacement for the warm rela- ionship shared by two people who understand each other's needs and can talk things over to- , gether, ' adult to adult. For her, there is another problem, that of getting back into circulation'. he is afraid that if she seeks ompanionship, she will acquire reputation; people will think nd have told her she should be ome with her children: She is xpeeted to be mother and father nd make a fulfilling life for her hildren. though her own life is ragically unfulfilling and unhap- y• Loneliness is often not that hich comes with aloneness but hat exists when two people have ifted apart and no longer have nything in common. Strangers hare the same room but there is silent barrier between them hat . cuts off communication. What they once felt for each other as died; they no longer have nything to talk about so they are iven to silence and emptiness ow well Sammy Cahn and; mmy Van Heusen understood is feeling when they wrote, "if ou find love, hang on to each aress and never let love go, for hen it's gone, you'll know the Wellness, the heartbreak only e lonely know". Sometimes this Wellness becomes so unbear- le that it drives them to seek mpanionship elsewhere — the ight neon lights the smoky rroom ... they sly- come-on for night of kinky sex the whin- y. But next morning, the pain is 11 there. Relief has only been -teary Joyce is young and attractive.. d alone. But she is alone by once. she hid, many Irrenos. th male and female, but ongly independent and self- fficient, she has no desire to be - me romantically involved with y one person Her moments one are moments she asures. away from the hubbub her work, the ringing of the ephone and the endless empty atter of people. Loneliness is a feeling she experiences en When it does come, it is at ties or social functions where pie are "paired off" and she Is outside . At Christnias- e, especially, which seems to the time that everything is red, she feels a sadness and emptiness that makes her feel out. 'She has never really •t S c a a h e a t p w w dr a s a t h a dr H Ji th y c w lo th lo ab co br ba a ke sti to an cn bo stn su co an al tre of tel ch not oft par peo tetim be sha an left Iiness of sitting in a room with no one to talk to; so much to think about: nothing to look forward to! SELF-INDUCED LONELINESS The most pathetic loneliness is that caused not by circumstance but by self. It is the tragic alone- ness that makes a person create an invisible shield around himself and shut everyone else outside` Selfcaused, this loneliness must also be self -cured, for no one can help unless that shield is re- moved. Very often that shield is there because people are afraid — afraid of involvement and hurt. afraid of reaching out, afraid there is no acceptance to be found. In the warm and beautiful chil- dren's book, "The Little Prince" by Antoine de Saint Exupery, the• little prince meets the fox who longs to be 'tamed', to 'establish ties'. "I'f you tame me," he says, "we shall 'need each other. To me, you will he unique in all the world. To you, i will be unique in all the world." Involvement carries a risk and the little prince makes excuses. He has no time, he has other things to do. But their loneliness draws them to- gether and the little prince does indeed tame the fox and become a part of his life. It carries with it the risk . of being: l iirt..and as always when friends part, they both cry. The little prince tells the fox it is his own fault he has been hurt but the fox says, "It has done me good", realizing that when nothing is risked, neither s' anything gained. The hurt l ornes noth- ing when they remember the joy that has been shared in the rela- tionship. Later, remembering the fox and their life together, the little prince comes to realize that "one runs the risk of weeping a little if one lets himself be tamed". It is this fear of "weeping a little" that often drives a person inward, away from involvement and the establishing of ties. The loner, not realizing that tears are sweeter when they are shared, withdraws from the joy and sorrow of involvement, to the The Wingham Advance -Timis,, August 31, 1 77--Pag is .TEEN YEARS—Loneliness can often be a problem during the teen years when the young adult is coping with problems of growing up. Unless they can belong to their peer group, there may be problem of feeling,alienated and the terrible stamp of'beingdifferent. emptiness of his own world which be feels has nothing to ` offer. There is no situation more pathetic or hopeless. ALONE BUT NEVER, LONELY Loneliness, unfortunately, is very often associated with being alone. Society advocates gregar- iousness, togetherness, swinging in pairs. If you are alone, you roust smell, or have mononu- eleosis . . _ or social disease! Twenty years ago, girls and boys went to dances alone and had fun because everyone danced with everyone else. Now you go with your own little group of friends; anyone who goes alone is left alone. How pathetic that people have not learned that a person can be and must be his own best friend — that being alone is not a tragedy but a real opportunity to search deep within one's soul and find answers to many questions and problems — that loneliness is something the manufacture in our own minds because we have not come to share that knowledge of ourselves. The French writer, Jean Paul Sartre, said it so well when he said, "If you are lonely when you are alone, you are in LONELINESS—The problems accompanied with loneliness can be prevalent at any age, but they seem more obvious in the elderly. It is an age wheel friends and loved ones have often died, leaving the person seemingly all alone in the world. Involvement in various activities can sometimes help these feelings of aloneness. --Photo by Kim Dadson bad company". But we do not seem to interested in getting to know ourselves, better. We be- eorne so obsessed with being part off THE world that we forget that- OUR world exists,,. a world within us that ,.we must learn to know and enjoy and participate in. ' • Why can we not be quiet and know this world, communicate with the inner being that makes us different from everyone else? We waste sso much time reaching out, seeking 'the tangible; when really, aligthe answers Reburied within ourselves, waiting to be- - discovered. Lovers, placing .so much importance on touching, holding . . . forgetting that the real touching is of the minds and what is held in. the heart is so much more important. For always, the most special com- munication is silence — sharing that which cannot be heard or touched Those who have learned this special silent communication with their inner selves will never be lonely. For they will have a special relationship with them- selves and be able to share it with others. INNER MUSIC OF SOLITUDE Anne Morrow Lindbergh, in her - book "Gift From the Sea", says each of us must learn to be alone, for "there is a quality to being alone that is incredibly precious, Life rushes back into the void, richer, more vivid, fuller than before". Attempting to make our lives happy, we "choke the space with continuous music, chatter and companionship to which we do not even listen. It is simply there to fill the vacuum. When the noise stops there is no honer music to take its place". Mrs. Lindbergh has practised her theory, 'getting away from it all' periodically to meditate and write. It is not a retreat from reality so much as a retreat to realization. The inward seeking makes her grateful for life and for times alone when "separated from my own species, 1 was nearer to others". Mostly, she finds, she is nearer to herself and finds renewed companionship and deeper love among others for "when one is a stranger to oneself then one is estranged from others too. Only when one is connected to one's own core is one con- nected to others". Mrs. Lindbergh finds that "core" through solitude — alone- ness which can be a blessing but is too often a burden. Reaching out to people is so futile if you have not first reached inward and come to know the inner soul that is you. Aloneness is not a tragedy if you use that time to revitalize and renew hopes and aspirations; review memories and accomp- lishments. Loneliness is the silent spectre haunting those who have not learned to know themselves and see their potential, realizing that, alone or not, they have the inner strength and ability to be very special people. NEXT: The stories of three people who have learned to cope with personal tragedy es death claims ones they love.