Quell.

Sometimes, after a storm, it takes time to realize it’s over.

Like the aftershock of a quake, the shudder lingers in our bones. The residual moisture in the air can hover as a fog. The debris that was tossed about in the wind takes time to settle to the ground.

Thunder may still echo in our eardrums, traces of lightning dance behind our eyelids. The heavy pounding of the rain, so deafening just moments ago, startles us with its absence.

Suddenly, there is quiet. And it is new, unfamiliar. There is no noise, no movement around us, nothing that calls our attention.

It’s almost ominous, this nothingness, this emptiness of any activity, or stimuli.

But is it nothing? Is it empty?

It’s so quiet that our pulse sings to us from within. Our breath replaces the wind with its ebbs and flows. And in place of the thunder, our thoughts clamor to be heard. Many of these thoughts are dreaded. And the more quiet it grows outside, the volume of our thoughts crescendos.

Soon, we miss the white noise of the storm, the muffling of this internal soliloquy. We yearn for the return of the torrential rain, to be pulled back out of ourselves. We want to mute the voices that call desperately from within – “please, listen,” they beg.

Perhaps the reason we love storms so much is because they mirror how we feel inside. But we can seek shelter from the weather outside. Where is the shelter inside? How can we find refuge, safety and calm if we are our own weather? How do we quell our own pain?

Pause.

Breathe.

Listen.

There is one voice beneath the many and it says, “together.”

Shells.

Why is the subject of loneliness so unspoken?
Wouldn’t speaking it aloud take away some of its sting?
A fact of life is that we live much of it alone, and yet, admitting the ache that comes with this void seems taboo, even shameful.
Each of us is a part of this vast universe, briefly shelled inside a third-dimensional vessel. We are together in this existence, but also separate.
We are alone within these skins, and yet all of us are in that together – so often, we forget this.
The salience of these bodily senses can fool us into believing that because we feel the cool air surround us, see the empty room before us, lack the tangible warmth of a body next to us – we are unequivocally alone in this life. We may know intellectually or spiritually that we’re supported. We can pick up a phone, walk down the street and find some form of company. But in the moment, damn – our minds are pretty convincing of our solitude.
And don’t get me wrong – a lifelong introvert, I need and love my solitude at times. It can often be freedom, re cooperation, survival. But during major life shifts and/or when I’m out of balance, the absence and the silence give me chills. I sink into the couch, wishing I could vanish within the creases of the fabric, yearning for the cushions to embrace me like the arms of those that I miss. The feeling seems to cover me in a weighted blanket of lead, immobilizing me in the delusion of separateness.
And then, after some time, I finally remember that there are others feeling the same. There are so many of us around the world sinking into their couches and carrying this fictional anvil of loneliness. If not at that very moment, we all have and will know this discomfort. And that very co-existence, that permeating empathy, that love… that’s the truth.
We are together even in solitude.
We are not alone in feeling alone.