Even Loners Want to Feel They Belong
By: Lois Templin
Tags: Writers Life, Friends, Relationships, Culture, Community

I am drawn to places with a strong sense of community and human interaction. This is a bit ironic because I am a loner at heart.

Napflion, Greece — Photo taken by Lois Templin

I love small towns, the comradery and connection of the people who live in them. I’m drawn to life in European villages where people see the world around them in real-time, not on a screen, and talk to the people they encounter during the day with the intimacy of a shared life where a casual nod or wave of the hand is not enough, and no acknowledgment is just rude.

I’m enchanted by outdoor cafes and places that encourage fellowship, friendship, and conversation. Sidewalk cafes (so prevalent in Europe and growing in popularity in the US) are the ultimate combination of community and intimacy.

I’m also enamored with the people who live in places like New York City or populated countries like India, where there are millions of people, but yet individuals create community and connection and a place of belonging among the hordes of people and endless metropolis. People stake out a part of the city and make it familiar and their own.

But I think what really draws me to these places is that people live their lives intertwined with the lives of others. In American suburbia, where I live, we tend to build a cocoon — a place that we can escape into and hide from the rest of the world. We drive into our garages, slip quickly into our houses, then relax in our fenced-in backyards. It is an escape from and armor against the world beyond our purchased borders.

We often live in one city and spend the majority of the week working in another. We aren’t around in our hometown enough to become a true member of it with all the commuting and working elsewhere, and we aren’t a part of the city where we work because we leave as soon as we are done with work to get home with time to spare before going to sleep and starting the routine over again.

When we go out to lunch where we work or grocery shop where we live, we do it in a self-imposed bubble keeping our thoughts to ourselves and never really looking at the people around us since we don’t expect to see anyone we know anyway. There is no belonging to either place, only residing in one and working in another.

The more we withdraw into the seclusion of our fenced-in homes and the expectation of being a single person in the sea of suburbia, the more we become an island contented with our own company and our isolating devices. Being a writer and a reader, this is not a bad place to be; however, being a writer and a reader, it can be a precarious place because of how easy it is to slip so deeply into it that there is no getting out.

I mentioned I’m a loner at heart. I could easily become a hermit if I don’t watch myself, but the danger of being a hermit is that when you want community and comradery, it is nowhere to be found. I push myself to stay connected, and though it is an effort at times, it is worth it for the resulting friendships and sense of belonging somewhere.

I think this is why I am drawn to small towns and dream of living in a European village. Life there requires some reliance on others, and as a result, more connection with the people you encounter each day. Not everything can be ordered online with same-day delivery. People bring food to their neighbors when they are going through a hard time, or as a thank you, or just because they made so much it should be shared. Friends and neighbors get together to do the hard jobs as a team, whether outside or in the kitchen. If more hands are needed, people offer theirs knowing they will need the same in return later.

The bonding and contributing are part of the tools necessary for survival, and with it comes a connection and belonging that can only be achieved by meaningful interaction with others. I love this, I miss this, and I can so easily slip away from this while submerged in overabundant suburbia.

My nature is to be withdrawn and find comfort in my aloneness, but I admire those who so effortlessly immerse themselves in a community and find where they belong. It is the desire to find this balance that draws me to places where people embrace their communities and expect everyone to do their part. This is also why I am drawn to European villages, to the idea of living in Greece or Italy, where people still cherish the old ways. I want to be in a place where the focus is on the here and now in a world only as big as your eyes can see, and not in the abyss found on a tiny screen held in the palm of your hand.

I know it is not easy to become part of the tightly-knit communities I dream about because I’ve been an outsider in them before making them my home — I know what to expect. It’s even more challenging in a foreign country, but that, too, I’ve experienced. It takes work to find your place and gain acceptance, but it’s a challenge I find exhilarating — as exhilarating as the discovery of new places, new people, new cultures, new ideas, and new outlooks.

I love my time alone, but what keeps me from being lonely is belonging to the community I reside in, knowing I just need to walk out my front door to be part of something. It’s that sense of belonging that anchors me confidently in my time alone. It is the desire for community, belonging, and exhilaration that draws my wandering soul to places where people are connected and deeply rooted in their world.