u/ThrowawaySisyphus281

On the back of my car is a steal your face sticker so big it almost takes up the entire back window. It is ungodly huge. I was sitting in traffic downtown with my sister not long after Bobby died. This man crossing the street behind my car signal to me and I rolled down my window and he came over. I’d never seen this man before in my life. But he said he saw my sticker and wanted to know how I felt about Bobby‘s death. And we talked about it. Then he went on his way and my sister asked who that was. I said I had no idea. And then she said, “but you talked to him like you’ve known him your entire life.” I just shrugged and said, “He was a Deadhead.”

Ever since I was a boy, I think all I ever wanted to be was a husband. It felt less like a goal and more like a calling I never quite had language for. I wasn’t particularly drawn to status or career ambition in the traditional sense. If I imagined a life that felt meaningful, it was always built around care—around being deeply devoted to one person and building a home with them.

When I was a teenager and into my early 20s, I used to read books about relationships and marriage the way some people study a craft or a profession. I watched talks and went to seminars about communication, commitment, and how to be a good partner. I wasn’t trying to optimize my life in a general sense—I was trying to learn how to do \\\*that one thing\\\* well.

And I did get to live it. I was married for 17 years.

I tried seriously, consistently, and imperfectly to be the best husband I knew how to be. I don’t think it came from a lack of effort on my part. But in the end, it still wasn’t enough for the relationship to survive. My wife left, and I’ve had a hard time reducing that story to something clean or simple. It just ended, and I’ve been carrying the weight of that ending ever since.

The years since then have been a kind of drifting. I’ve been trying to build an identity that isn’t defined by being someone’s husband. I’ve tried to be okay with that. Some days I am. Other days it feels like something essential is missing, like a role I was built around that no longer has a place to land.

I feel most alive in relationships where there is real emotional closeness—where I’m able to care for someone and be cared for in return. Not in a performative way, but in a quiet, ordinary, shared-life way. That’s always been where I feel most like myself.

In the years since my divorce, I’ve also had to confront the possibility that I may not be married again. Not because I don’t want it, but because life doesn’t always circle back to the things we once assumed were permanent. I’ve had to sit with loneliness, with regret, and with the parts of myself I don’t fully know how to bring forward alone.

There’s a more tender side of me—sensitive, attentive, deeply affectionate—that only really shows up when I feel safe and emotionally connected to someone. I sometimes worry that version of me will fade if it isn’t ever received again. Not in a dramatic sense, just slowly, from disuse.

I’m not sure what I’m expecting by writing all of this. I don’t even know if I’m really looking for a response. It just felt like something needed to be said out loud, somewhere outside my own head.

If you’ve read this far, thank you for that.

Ever since I was a boy, I think all I ever wanted to be was a husband. It felt less like a goal and more like a calling I never quite had language for. I wasn’t particularly drawn to status or career ambition in the traditional sense. If I imagined a life that felt meaningful, it was always built around care—around being deeply devoted to one person and building a home with them.

When I was a teenager and into my early 20s, I used to read books about relationships and marriage the way some people study a craft or a profession. I watched talks and went to seminars about communication, commitment, and how to be a good partner. I wasn’t trying to optimize my life in a general sense—I was trying to learn how to do *that one thing* well.

And I did get to live it. I was married for 17 years.

I tried seriously, consistently, and imperfectly to be the best husband I knew how to be. I don’t think it came from a lack of effort on my part. But in the end, it still wasn’t enough for the relationship to survive. My wife left, and I’ve had a hard time reducing that story to something clean or simple. It just ended, and I’ve been carrying the weight of that ending ever since.

The years since then have been a kind of drifting. I’ve been trying to build an identity that isn’t defined by being someone’s husband. I’ve tried to be okay with that. Some days I am. Other days it feels like something essential is missing, like a role I was built around that no longer has a place to land.

I feel most alive in relationships where there is real emotional closeness—where I’m able to care for someone and be cared for in return. Not in a performative way, but in a quiet, ordinary, shared-life way. That’s always been where I feel most like myself.

In the years since my divorce, I’ve also had to confront the possibility that I may not be married again. Not because I don’t want it, but because life doesn’t always circle back to the things we once assumed were permanent. I’ve had to sit with loneliness, with regret, and with the parts of myself I don’t fully know how to bring forward alone.

There’s a more tender side of me—sensitive, attentive, deeply affectionate—that only really shows up when I feel safe and emotionally connected to someone. I sometimes worry that version of me will fade if it isn’t ever received again. Not in a dramatic sense, just slowly, from disuse.

I’m not sure what I’m expecting by writing all of this. I don’t even know if I’m really looking for a response. It just felt like something needed to be said out loud, somewhere outside my own head.

If you’ve read this far, thank you for that.

Ever since I was a boy, I think all I ever wanted to be was a husband. It felt less like a goal and more like a calling I never quite had language for. I wasn’t particularly drawn to status or career ambition in the traditional sense. If I imagined a life that felt meaningful, it was always built around care—around being deeply devoted to one person and building a home with them.

When I was a teenager and into my early 20s, I used to read books about relationships and marriage the way some people study a craft or a profession. I watched talks and went to seminars about communication, commitment, and how to be a good partner. I wasn’t trying to optimize my life in a general sense—I was trying to learn how to do that one thing well.

And I did get to live it. I was married for 17 years.

I tried seriously, consistently, and imperfectly to be the best husband I knew how to be. I don’t think it came from a lack of effort on my part. But in the end, it still wasn’t enough for the relationship to survive. My wife left, and I’ve had a hard time reducing that story to something clean or simple. It just ended, and I’ve been carrying the weight of that ending ever since.

The years since then have been a kind of drifting. I’ve been trying to build an identity that isn’t defined by being someone’s husband. I’ve tried to be okay with that. Some days I am. Other days it feels like something essential is missing, like a role I was built around that no longer has a place to land.

I feel most alive in relationships where there is real emotional closeness—where I’m able to care for someone and be cared for in return. Not in a performative way, but in a quiet, ordinary, shared-life way. That’s always been where I feel most like myself.

In the years since my divorce, I’ve also had to confront the possibility that I may not be married again. Not because I don’t want it, but because life doesn’t always circle back to the things we once assumed were permanent. I’ve had to sit with loneliness, with regret, and with the parts of myself I don’t fully know how to bring forward alone.

There’s a more tender side of me—sensitive, attentive, deeply affectionate—that only really shows up when I feel safe and emotionally connected to someone. I sometimes worry that version of me will fade if it isn’t ever received again. Not in a dramatic sense, just slowly, from disuse.

I’m not sure what I’m expecting by writing all of this. I don’t even know if I’m really looking for a response. It just felt like something needed to be said out loud, somewhere outside my own head.

If you’ve read this far, thank you for that.

I’ve reached the age where loneliness no longer feels dramatic. It feels quiet. Familiar. Like a lamp left on in another room.

I work in the literary world and spend most of my days surrounded by stories, which may explain why I still believe connection is possible even in a culture that seems designed to avoid it. I’m a writer, a musician, a man with a cat curled somewhere nearby most nights, trying to build a life that still has softness in it.

I miss intimacy in the old-fashioned sense. Not sex. Not games. Not “situationships.” I miss being known. I miss private language between two people. I miss hearing a phone buzz and hoping it’s one particular person.

The nights are the hardest. There are moments where I reach across the bed half-asleep, instinctively wanting to put my arm around someone, and there’s nobody there. That empty space can ache in a way that’s difficult to admit out loud. It’s strange how physical loneliness becomes after enough time passes.

I suppose I’m old school in the way I love. Domestic. Romantic. Loyal. The kind of person who notices little things. I like long conversations that drift into vulnerable territory at 1 a.m. I like wit, intelligence, mutual curiosity, and the kind of banter that slowly becomes affection without either person realizing exactly when it happened.

As for attraction: I’ve always been drawn to women who feel warm and real to me — short, thick women with big hearts and deep minds. Kindness matters. Emotional intelligence matters. The ability to laugh at absurdity matters.

I’m not looking for anything shady or purely physical. I’m looking for a genuine connection with someone who also feels the absence of it. Someone who misses tenderness. Someone who wants to matter to another person again.

Maybe it starts with a few messages.
Maybe it becomes the reason we look at our phones and smile.
Maybe one morning there’s finally a good morning text waiting for both of us.

That would be enough to begin.

In a few weeks, I’m effectively walking away from my current life. To be fair, it’s already a pretty solitary existence anyway, so this isn’t some dramatic disappearing act as much as it is finally admitting that the way I’ve been living no longer fits. I have a nice cushy life in a comfortable suburb in a semi luxurious apartment… And I want to take a metaphorical match to the whole thing.

I’m packing up my cat, leaving the Midwest, and heading to Rock Springs, Wyoming.

The plan is simple and strange at the same time: six months of motel life while I rework and republish books I previously had out in the world, write a new one, and try to reconnect with a version of living that doesn’t feel like it’s grinding my nervous system into dust every day.

At some point, the entire system stopped resonating with me. Not just politics or culture or social media nonsense — all of it. The pace. The expectations. The constant pressure to optimize yourself into a marketable product. The noise. It all feels like too much imposed on a human psyche that was never designed for this level of nonstop input and performance.

So this is my experiment in slowing down.

Extended stay motels. Long drives. Coffee. Writing. Desert/mountain silence. Working remotely during the day and rebuilding my creative life at night. Maybe figuring out who I am when I’m no longer trying to keep up with a world that increasingly feels unreal to me.

I’m treating it like an adventure more than a collapse. I’m actually excited about it.

I know the odds are slim, but I figured I’d throw this into the void and see what happens: if anyone in or around Rock Springs would be open to talking, grabbing coffee, taking a drive, or just connecting with another human being trying to live a little differently, feel free to reach out.

At the very least, you’ll probably get cat pictures and strange conversations about books, isolation, reinvention, and why Wyoming feels like the right place to disappear for a while.

In a few weeks, I’m effectively walking away from my current life. To be fair, it’s already a pretty solitary existence anyway, so this isn’t some dramatic disappearing act as much as it is finally admitting that the way I’ve been living no longer fits.

I’m packing up my cat, leaving the Midwest, and heading to Rock Springs, Wyoming.

The plan is simple and strange at the same time: six months of motel life while I refine my remote job situation, rework and republish books I previously had out in the world, and try to reconnect with a version of living that doesn’t feel like it’s grinding my nervous system into dust every day.

At some point, the entire system stopped resonating with me. Not just politics or culture or social media nonsense — all of it. The pace. The expectations. The constant pressure to optimize yourself into a marketable product. The noise. It all feels like too much imposed on a human psyche that was never designed for this level of nonstop input and performance.

So this is my experiment in slowing down.

Cheap motels. Long drives. Coffee. Writing. Desert silence. Working remotely during the day and rebuilding my creative life at night. Maybe figuring out who I am when I’m no longer trying to keep up with a world that increasingly feels unreal to me.

I’m treating it like an adventure more than a collapse. I’m actually excited about it.

I know the odds are slim, but I figured I’d throw this into the void and see what happens: if anyone in or around Rock Springs would be open to talking, grabbing coffee, taking a drive, or just connecting with another human being trying to live a little differently, feel free to reach out.

At the very least, you’ll probably get cat pictures and strange conversations about books, isolation, reinvention, and why Wyoming feels like the right place to disappear for a while.

A while ago, I posted on here about the things that I realized about my marriage and divorce after four years. I wrote that post largely from a place of having dealt with everything.

I don't know what's happened to me this week. I don't know if it was the series of dreams I had or the conversation with a woman that turned out to be a scammer, or if it’s just that spring is here and it evokes so many different feelings. All I know is I’m alone and I’m hurting. Bad.

Bad.

I know this isn't the sort of post a woman wants to see... or reply to. Who wants to talk to a hurting man? Hurting implies weakness. Hurting implies you're not the picture perfect version of yourself you're supposed to before you go posting online looking for romance. I'm not looking for romance. I don't even remember what it feels like or looks like. Once upon a time there was a version of me that laughed and loved and lived. But those days are gone and I'm left here. I know it's not going to get better. I look ahead at the future and don't really see one for me. I'm alone and I'm going to remain alone. I'm in pain and I always will be. And that sweet, tender, vulnerable version of me, the one that only comes out when I'm loved, is going to remain hidden, known by no one, seen by no one, forgotten by all until, at last, it is forgotten by me too. 

Signed,

No one 

It’s been almost four years. I’ve mostly moved on, though I do not date and really have no intention of it.

I don’t dream often, or if I do, I rarely remember them the next morning.

But…

Last night I had the most powerful and vivid dream of my life. So detailed, so alive. It has remained in my head all day and I cannot shake it.

She was in it, that’s all I will say about the details.

Here’s thing, I haven’t so much as been hugged by a woman in those four years, to say nothing of deeper forms of affection. And I think I had forgotten what it was like, to be near someone, to feel touched, to have my arms around someone I love, to feel warmth, the electric charge of another body. I got used to living without it. But this dream dismantled all of that and has left me feeling an inner emptiness today greater than any I have ever known. I woke up weeping.

I know I will be alone for the rest of my life. I have mostly adjusted to it. I have built a solitary life and I deal with it.

But it would be nice to experience the love language of physical touch again.

Signed,

Horrifically Lonely