(Note: this is a rant, not a request for advice. Perhaps you might want to comment on your own situation, though)
How do you deal with the loneliness of the freelance life?
I've been working at home, freelancing as a cartoonist, writer, animator and various hybrids of the above, for nearly 30 years. I'm fairly successful in my work and have been published widely. Like any freelancer, I have up and down periods financially. But socially it's been a long consistent slide downward.
You'd think that after 30 years of working at home it would get easier. Actually it just seems to get harder. My close friends from college are all thousands of miles away. In fact, last year I went to New York and saw my so-called best friend face-to-face for the first time in over 15 years.
Local acquaintances are all working full-time in companies, usually in responsible positions, so it's rare that anyone would respond favorably to a chatty phone call in the middle of the day. Evenings they're either with their families or at obligatory business functions. And evenings I'm with my own wife and children.
I live and work in a fantastic house, designed by me and the construction supervised by me. It's our family's palace, surrounded by half an acre of gorgeous garden overlooking a panorama of wild ginger fields, jungle-clad mountain slopes and a view of the sea beyond. It's a paradise. But during the day there's nobody around but me and the birds in the garden, a number of housewives, local laborers and a pod of unemployed drunks who hang out day and night at a local food stall which sells cheap beer.
My wife works a stressful job in town. She leaves the house at 7:00 am and is normally home around 7:30 pm. Although our 25-year marriage is wonderful, I do have to restrain the neediness of my loneliness when she comes home. Our kids are typically obnoxious rebellious teenagers, and most of our interactions are unpleasant ones about homework and chores.
Maybe it's because I'm in my 50s, and it just seems harder to make new friends at that age. I have a couple good acquaintances. If you understand the difference between a friend and an acquaintance, then these two are on the cusp inbetween. Either one of them is delighted to meet me for lunch anytime, which requires me to take half a day off from work to run into town and back. Which I do sometimes, but it throws the work schedule out the window. Both live on opposite sides of the area from me, so there is never the opportunity to just pop in for a drink. My closest friend-acquaintance is a woman executive, happily married with two kids just like me. We meet for lunch sometimes, and chat a bit by e-mail. There is nothing at all sexual there, not even in the background. Yet we both obviously hold back from full soul-baring friendship. Both our spouses are fully accepting on the surface, but I suppose there's always a hint of suspicion, that comes out whenever there's an argument at home. When my wife feels the need to hit me with a low blow, it's: "Oh, and another thing, I just don't get it what's going on between you and (my female friend)!"
My better friends, the ones who would occasionally phone me during the day just for a brief chat, have all moved far away.
Sure, I can stay in contact by phone, e-mail and so on. But it just isn't the same thing. Maybe it's that we're not of the generation which is used to having 15 chat windows open while simultaneously posting on forums and firing off e-mails and cell phone text messages. I swear I had more frequent and satisfying interactions before the Internet, by actual written or typed letters which took a week to arrive in each direction. The art of eloquent and deeply felt correspondence has died off in the age of instant bursts of chatter and smilies.
I'm a very light drinker, and detest talking to drunks. There is one local pub, but for the above reason I find it always a huge letdown when I make an occasional visit there. I've never been good at discussing "guy" topics like sports and cars, neither of which I have the slightest interest in. To make it worse, I'm American and most of them are English or Australian. Do I know a thing about cricket? Do I care? Not on your life! Meanwhile, the tables of mixed men and women are usually the heaviest drinkers of all.
Almost all of my human interaction, other than with my wife, kids and construction workers, is with my clients on the rare occasions we need to meet.
I'm a pro. I get the job done. I can usually beat the procrastination gremlins. But it shocks me sometimes to realize that I haven't uttered a single word for 14 hours straight.
At the beginning of my career, I never felt any sense of isolation. I was new, hungry and focused on the work. I'm still hungry and focused. There is no security in my work, no chance to lay back and rest on my laurels. But in my 50s now I start to feel my physical energy waning just a bit.
I feel sad so much of the time, that the end result of all my years of effort is a body of work and some fond memories of bouts with fame, a nice house, a couple healthy (but obnoxious) kids and a decent marriage. But that's all. It's great, and I'm grateful for every bit of it. But it still feels incomplete. It often feels like I'm a prisoner on a little tiny island paradise, and my wife and kids get daily visitation rights.
Humans are social animals. So I don't always feel human. Those low lifes and drifters at the drink stand don't have any of my comforts, but they have a gang of friends. They're more human than I am.
The biggest drawback to working alone at home is that I have so few chances to meet new people, which means the pool of potential soulmates remains stagnant.
I feel isolated, inhibited with the people I do know, and even inhibited at home. If it wasn't for the writing as outlet, I'd self-destruct.
Right, I know, I can join a club, do volunteer work, go to a gym, yada yada yada. I haven't put enough effort in those directions, it's true. I'll work on it.
And here I am, telling you all this. I don't know you at all. But more than anyone I do know, I think (some of) you will understand. There must be other freelancers out there who know exactly what I'm talking about. I've heard of, read of, many writers and artists who exist in nearly identical conundrums, even rich and famous ones who end up drugging themselves or blowing their brains out to 'solve' the loneliness problem. I don't intend to end up one of those.
So now that I've let this out like so much psychological vomit, maybe you can share your own situation. At least it's nice to know that there is company in freelance loneliness.
Cheers!
How do you deal with the loneliness of the freelance life?
I've been working at home, freelancing as a cartoonist, writer, animator and various hybrids of the above, for nearly 30 years. I'm fairly successful in my work and have been published widely. Like any freelancer, I have up and down periods financially. But socially it's been a long consistent slide downward.
You'd think that after 30 years of working at home it would get easier. Actually it just seems to get harder. My close friends from college are all thousands of miles away. In fact, last year I went to New York and saw my so-called best friend face-to-face for the first time in over 15 years.
Local acquaintances are all working full-time in companies, usually in responsible positions, so it's rare that anyone would respond favorably to a chatty phone call in the middle of the day. Evenings they're either with their families or at obligatory business functions. And evenings I'm with my own wife and children.
I live and work in a fantastic house, designed by me and the construction supervised by me. It's our family's palace, surrounded by half an acre of gorgeous garden overlooking a panorama of wild ginger fields, jungle-clad mountain slopes and a view of the sea beyond. It's a paradise. But during the day there's nobody around but me and the birds in the garden, a number of housewives, local laborers and a pod of unemployed drunks who hang out day and night at a local food stall which sells cheap beer.
My wife works a stressful job in town. She leaves the house at 7:00 am and is normally home around 7:30 pm. Although our 25-year marriage is wonderful, I do have to restrain the neediness of my loneliness when she comes home. Our kids are typically obnoxious rebellious teenagers, and most of our interactions are unpleasant ones about homework and chores.
Maybe it's because I'm in my 50s, and it just seems harder to make new friends at that age. I have a couple good acquaintances. If you understand the difference between a friend and an acquaintance, then these two are on the cusp inbetween. Either one of them is delighted to meet me for lunch anytime, which requires me to take half a day off from work to run into town and back. Which I do sometimes, but it throws the work schedule out the window. Both live on opposite sides of the area from me, so there is never the opportunity to just pop in for a drink. My closest friend-acquaintance is a woman executive, happily married with two kids just like me. We meet for lunch sometimes, and chat a bit by e-mail. There is nothing at all sexual there, not even in the background. Yet we both obviously hold back from full soul-baring friendship. Both our spouses are fully accepting on the surface, but I suppose there's always a hint of suspicion, that comes out whenever there's an argument at home. When my wife feels the need to hit me with a low blow, it's: "Oh, and another thing, I just don't get it what's going on between you and (my female friend)!"
My better friends, the ones who would occasionally phone me during the day just for a brief chat, have all moved far away.
Sure, I can stay in contact by phone, e-mail and so on. But it just isn't the same thing. Maybe it's that we're not of the generation which is used to having 15 chat windows open while simultaneously posting on forums and firing off e-mails and cell phone text messages. I swear I had more frequent and satisfying interactions before the Internet, by actual written or typed letters which took a week to arrive in each direction. The art of eloquent and deeply felt correspondence has died off in the age of instant bursts of chatter and smilies.
I'm a very light drinker, and detest talking to drunks. There is one local pub, but for the above reason I find it always a huge letdown when I make an occasional visit there. I've never been good at discussing "guy" topics like sports and cars, neither of which I have the slightest interest in. To make it worse, I'm American and most of them are English or Australian. Do I know a thing about cricket? Do I care? Not on your life! Meanwhile, the tables of mixed men and women are usually the heaviest drinkers of all.
Almost all of my human interaction, other than with my wife, kids and construction workers, is with my clients on the rare occasions we need to meet.
I'm a pro. I get the job done. I can usually beat the procrastination gremlins. But it shocks me sometimes to realize that I haven't uttered a single word for 14 hours straight.
At the beginning of my career, I never felt any sense of isolation. I was new, hungry and focused on the work. I'm still hungry and focused. There is no security in my work, no chance to lay back and rest on my laurels. But in my 50s now I start to feel my physical energy waning just a bit.
I feel sad so much of the time, that the end result of all my years of effort is a body of work and some fond memories of bouts with fame, a nice house, a couple healthy (but obnoxious) kids and a decent marriage. But that's all. It's great, and I'm grateful for every bit of it. But it still feels incomplete. It often feels like I'm a prisoner on a little tiny island paradise, and my wife and kids get daily visitation rights.
Humans are social animals. So I don't always feel human. Those low lifes and drifters at the drink stand don't have any of my comforts, but they have a gang of friends. They're more human than I am.
The biggest drawback to working alone at home is that I have so few chances to meet new people, which means the pool of potential soulmates remains stagnant.
I feel isolated, inhibited with the people I do know, and even inhibited at home. If it wasn't for the writing as outlet, I'd self-destruct.
Right, I know, I can join a club, do volunteer work, go to a gym, yada yada yada. I haven't put enough effort in those directions, it's true. I'll work on it.
And here I am, telling you all this. I don't know you at all. But more than anyone I do know, I think (some of) you will understand. There must be other freelancers out there who know exactly what I'm talking about. I've heard of, read of, many writers and artists who exist in nearly identical conundrums, even rich and famous ones who end up drugging themselves or blowing their brains out to 'solve' the loneliness problem. I don't intend to end up one of those.
So now that I've let this out like so much psychological vomit, maybe you can share your own situation. At least it's nice to know that there is company in freelance loneliness.
Cheers!
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