Solitude

My family has always been a paradox. My mom likes to think we are a close family. Every holiday we cook food together and share the day languishing around, laughing at the funnier memories we have of each other. But its days like this that make me wonder what we really mean to each other.

My mom is upstairs, in her room as usual. My little brother is holed up in his room watching t.v. and playing with his toys. His room is right next to mine, bottom floor and all the way across the house. It’s comforting knowing someone is so close to him at night. And I’m in the living room, the very middle of the house. We haven’t really talked to each other all day, except for my little brother asking me to make him something to eat or drink. The only sounds in this house are the televisions and computers. I could go sit and watch cartoons with my brother, but a person can only stomach so much conversation with a nine year old.

I feel more like a live in maid than a member of the family half the time. I’m asked to do this or that for the children, and that’s all I do. If I work then my parents would have to pay for a babysitter. So I watch my brother’s kids and my little brother. And I should be grateful since I don’t have to work, and it’s really lucky that I don’t ask for a lot of stuff since no one can afford to pay me. I hope you detected the sarcasm in the previous sentence. I’m a real life Rapunzel, stuck up in the castle with no way down, except there will not a prince strolling by on a gallant steed for me. I realize I moved out here to be near my family but I just thought…things would have changed. But they can never change; because the problem isn’t geographical, it’s me.

This isn’t closeness I feel. This is solitude. And I’ve felt it every day of my life. I’ve never had a boyfriend or lover. My best friend’s have all married or moved away. I mean, everyone knows that when you marry, you have no time for friends. More sarcasm, couldn’t be avoided.

I have my family, but the yearly holiday gatherings don’t seem to come soon enough. I’m not delusional enough to believe it’s everyone else in the world with the problem of ignoring me. I know that this…loneliness comes from me. I’m not beautiful but there have been guys interested, admittedly only a few, and I have friends and family so why do I feel so damn lonely?

I just want someone to love me. I need to know what that feels like, when you look at a person and just know that this person wakes up and goes to sleep thinking of you. That you will always be their number one priority. And that the idea of leaving you will never cross their thoughts. And you know this because it’s the same thing you’re going through too.

I don’t know why I want love so much anyway. I’ve never seen anyone in my family make a marriage work. My parents were together for 21 years before the split. I’m only 23 and I can’t fathom the idea of having someone want to be with you for the duration of a lifetime, and then leave. My oldest brother is on his second marriage. He is currently in marriage counseling with his wife, and they have two young children that half the time, they treat like they are a burden. My younger brother is separated from his wife. They married way too young, but tried to make it work at least. My mom and stepdad had trouble a few years back when he cheated on my mom. I have to say that sometimes you think you know your parents, but you really don’t. My mom forgave him, and for a woman who calls herself a bitch, proudly, it was a shock. My father has been divorced twice and seems to be working his way through all of the town’s single and married women that want him.

Despite all of this I still dream about love. But it’s not the love I see every day with my family. I want the whole soul mate, never leave you, work through your problems – love. And since I’m sitting in alone, in a quiet house, I guess there is no such thing. Or maybe it’s that I keep thinking love is supposed to be perfect. So why should a selfish-immature little woman child deserve love? I figure the day I can answer that question is the day I will find love.