On being needed ...

Tweet

I always think of myself as a happy solitary. I like my own company and groups and crowds invoke an involuntary nausea.

But last night I was barely able to sleep from sheer loneliness.

It hit me that I'm single again.

Now I don't have even the illusion of meeting another's needs, to be - I'm not sure of what word captures the right nuance - provider, builder, strong right arm, shoulder to cry on. To be needed in a certain way is one of my deeper hungers.

The guy I met four years ago almost to the day is away right now; we haven't even spoken on the phone.

Momentarily freed of pressure I finally have the emotional space in which to mourn the loss of love.

So I spent my night remembering him sitting on my leg, thinking of smiling at his profile when he looked especially sweet.

A miserable time but one I needed to live through to prepare for life without someone who needs me.