Quotes About Loneliness

It is a trial to live in such a retired corner of the country, where one rarely sees anyone worth seeing.

But it was not so much the fresh air that she needed as a few minutes of solitude, a few minutes in which to collect herself. She stood to the side of one open doorway, half hidden by the heavy velvet drapery, and felt a raw ache at the back of her throat. She wanted to cry, she realized. For all the great popularity and success the evening was bringing her she felt a terrible loneliness.

Oh, God, Becky, I want you, he said shakily. I must get you back home quickly, love. It is dangerous to be alone like this.

Already it felt like a dream. Already she felt the painful loneliness of the coming weeks and months—perhaps years.

He looked as if he would dearly love to escape, Henry thought as she too stood momentarily alone at the other side of the ballroom.

Did you think you were the only one? Is it possible that you are so arrogant?" he asked, in tones of wonderment. Sandoz was blinking rapidly now. "Did you think you were the only one ever to wonder if what we do is worth the price we pay? Did you honestly believe that you alone, of all those who have gone, were the single man to lose God? Do you think we would have a name for the sin of despair, if only you had experienced it?

Sometimes nothing is the scariest thing of all

By the time we got to Ferrington, I was laughing at Will's stories about Rockpoint High. It seemed the kids gave the teachers a hard time; they were always cutting up and saying funny things. Will was good at imitating their Down-East accents, but I had a feeling Susan was right about his not having any friends. It was as though Will spent most of his school day watching and listening.

By the time we got to Ferrington, I was laughing at Will's stories about Rockpoint High. It seemed the kids gave the teachers a hard time; they were always cutting up and saying funny things. Will was good at imitating their Down-East accents, but I had a feeling Susan was right about his not having any friends. It sounded as if he spent most of his school day watching and listening.

She was, for several unpleasant moments, the isolated, lonely, insecure person she had been just three years earlier, a social blunderer, a locker-room towel for the maladjusted, unable to sell an article or figure out what to wear. Pull yourself together, she thought; it wasn't so bad.

Of course, not every single person was lonely, but he guessed that she was. She seemed in need of comfort and care, like a stray animal that gets fed by various kindly people but never held.

She couldn't tell if she was just pulling anything available into her sadness.

I get so lonely sometimes, I could put a box on my head and mail myself to a stranger.

Who but a drunk, I wonder looking back, could sit on the porch alone and get in an argument?)

It's hard to be an articulate ghost.

So I arrive alone alongside Daddy's home hospital bed. There's the bleach from the sheets and the air tinny with iodine. Under the air conditioner grind, his breathing is labored. Honeysuckle vines cling to the window screen, and a chameleon hangs by its claws.

a dysfunctional family is any family with more than one person in it. In other words, the boat I can feel so lonely in actually holds us all.

But I still feel awe for us—yes, for the masters who wrought lasting beauty from their hard lives, but for the rest of us, too, for the great courage all of us show in trying to wring some truth from the godawful mess of a single life. To bring oneself to others makes the whole planet less lonely. The nobility of everybody trying boggles the mind. And

A dowdy, depressed dwarf.

i only know how to exist when i'm wanted.

girls like us are hardly ever wanted, you know we're used up. and sad. and drunk. and perpetually waiting by the phone for someone to pick up and say "you did good." well, you did good

Have I lived enough? Have I loved enough? Have I considered Right Action enough, have I come to any conclusion? Have I experienced happiness with sufficient gratitude? Have I endured loneliness with grace? - A Thousand Mornings, Mary Oliver

LONELINESS I too have known loneliness. I too have known what it is to feel misunderstood, rejected, and suddenly not at all beautiful. Oh, mother earth, your comfort is great, your arms never withhold. It has saved my life to know this. Your rivers flowing, your roses opening in the morning. Oh, motions of tenderness!

I had to go away for a few days so I called the kennel and made an appointment. I guess Bear overheard the conversation. "Love and company," said Bear, "are the adornments that change everything. I know they'll be nice to me, but I'll be sad, sad, sad." And pitifully he wrung his paws. I cancelled the trip.