The problem with being alone

I’m an introvert and I like being on my own. Solitude is my mistress. It’s my biggest strength and weakness too, as I recently wrote.

I guess I’m very fortunate in this particular dimension of life. Given my character, I could’ve perhaps struggled to find a partner, to build a family. I didn’t. I met my love when I was young (and she was younger!) and we’ve been together for almost 23 years. We have four kids. I love my family and am proud of it.

At the end of last year, we had to go through a major change. Our landlord in California decided to sell his house so we used the opportunity to move to Florida which was always the plan because of my kids’ tennis careers (must sound exotic to some readers but we’re a tennis family). However, my oldest son is a junior in high school and we didn’t want to disrupt his final couple of years before college. So I now rent a small place and “commute” between California and Florida: a couple of weeks with my son, a couple with the rest of my family in Florida. Not ideal, but this temporary arrangement is needed.

For several months now I’ve been traveling back and forth. It’s fine. Not perfect but with the pain of the big move now behind, flying between two sunny states with a small bag twice a month is not painful at all.

When I am with my son, I’m essentially on my own. He does track and cross country and doesn’t return from school until six. I sleep, I work, I run, I write. I find ways to deal with stress (not complaining but there is a lot of…