Leave Me ALONE

I love being a mother, wife, friend, sister, business owner etc etc etc etc - but as much as I love being all of those things, I also love just plain BEING ALONE. My world is a noisy one. My kids talk to me endlessly, my husband talks to me (although I of course complain he does not talk enough to me, but there's another post altogether), and my gorgeous friends call or text me often. My clients call a lot (thank god. I have school fees to pay), my email beeps on my phone endlessly (thank god. I have a mortgage to pay) and in general my world is nearly never a quiet one. Even when there is no other living soul around (either virtually or physically), my brain is often going at a million miles an hour and that means that quiet - blessed, calm, sweet silence - is something I rarely ever get.

I do not know the experience of quiet contemplation, navel gazing, meditation, daydreaming, chilling out or doing nothing at all. The few times I've tried it, I've lasted all of 3.4 seconds before I get bored or my mind wanders to the shopping list or the dinner menu. My version of "quiet time" is the 20 minutes I allow myself most mornings to eat breakfast, read the paper (or check email), or read a book between the kids/gym/crazy morning routine and the time I head out the door to work in the morning. 20 minutes. That's it. I don't get it most days - but I get it a couple of times a week and that's enough for me. I used to consider my gym time as quiet time, but now there are all these annoying ladies who know me and want to TALK to me while I am there, and I have yet to master the "shut the fuck up, would you?" look in my eye as I lift the hand weights.

Various things have conspired in my life in recent weeks so that my beloved quiet time (well, the emzee version of quiet) is disrupted - and I didn't realise quite how much this is annoying me until this afternoon. Through some clever planning on my part, this afternoon I had about 25 minutes on my own in a shopping mall, and then went to see a girly movie all by myself (kids and DH were at boy/kid movies). Rather than enjoy it, I spent most of the time feeling as crumpled as an origami crane. I struggled to really just enjoy myself. Ridiculous, right? I finally get some peace and quiet, and I didn't enjoy it much at all. I'm not entirely sure why that is - after craving my alone time, I finally get it, so I should be happy, right?

The funny thing is, I was always one of those people who believed you could rest - and be alone - when you're dead. So now, while you are still taking breath, is when you should be hanging out with people and doing stuff and being busy. I think I still feel that way, but in recent weeks I've suddenly understood the value and joy in just being alone.I have no desire to go back to being single and childfree and anti-social. I love my life and consider myself extremely blessed to have all the noise I have...it's just that sometimes, I'd just like to be left alone.

And this, my friends, is currently my biggest guilty pleasure - that for a small block of time, a couple of times a week, I answer to NOBODY. That 20 minutes feels ridiculously decadent. I sometimes feel guilty about it, or selfish about it, or somehow even a bit wicked for coveting it as much as I do....but I'm just going to keep on trying to fit it in. 

What's your guilty pleasure?