Introverted Dad with a wife, two daughters, two dogs, and two cats reporting in. Wife and kid #1 are both high energy. I love my home life, but there is definitely some part of my psyche that is drained by it.

I took a couple of days to drive to the middle of nowhere in Oregon to see the eclipse by myself. My goal was literally to be as far from other people and as solitary as possible for the whole trip. (Not exactly easy given the expected crowds, but that was my hope.)

I slept in the back of my truck and barely spoke to a soul in 48 hours. It was absolute bliss.

I'd like to figure out to get a little more of that solitude in my life, but it's hard. Anytime I'm out recharging my spiritual batteries, my wife is at home solo-parenting with the kids draining hers more than twice as fast as usual.

Pics and video of the eclipse:

https://imgur.com/gallery/AWPxf

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8PDDX1vnXM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsuxK81KnPw

We should start a club, one where none of us meet up in person :)

There might be some sense in that - pool together resources to rent or lease a large area to camp in, with centralized things like hot showers or kitchens with refridgerators, and maybe wifi, but otherwise mostly just spread-out campgrounds where people can go and not be bothered, but not so cut off as to be worried about breaking a leg and getting eaten by a coyote.

A commune of solitude if you will.

We could call it a peculiune, given that "commune" comes from the Latin word for things held in common, and "peculiaris" would seem to be its antonym.

What do kids want? Your soul. How much do they want? All of it.

I love my daughter. That's the truth of it though. Sometimes it makes me you happy and you want to give and give and give. Sometimes it makes me you unhappy and you want to curse them for their wretched selfish neediness. It doesn't matter though. They'll take and take.

Of course I was the same way with my parents so it's all fair enough. But like you say, sometimes I find myself humming Hungry Heart ("I got a wife and kids in Baltimore Jack, I went out for a ride and I never came back") and just wishing they'd all just leave me along for a week. A day. A couple of minutes.

I did this for one week last year. I was in the alps, doing some snowboarding, some work and some reading. It was great. Especially being alone in a country where I didn't speak the language well enough to hold casual conversation for too long.

Was still happy when my girlfriend arrived after a week though. But that one week was indeed 'bliss'.

My girlfriend and I broke up a 15 year long relationship approximately one year ago and while I did enjoy having time alone back when we were together, after so much time I still can't stand being alone as the default. I miss the sharing, the laughs, the little moments (good or bad!) that seem insignificant but that turn out to be core to the relationship, that no friend seem to be able to replace. While I do enjoy some activities briefly, everything I do retrospectively seems like an attempt to escape and drown out the drone of loneliness. Being able to share is such a catalyst to any experience that things feel sort of pointless: does a falling tree make a sound if no one's around to hear it? Maybe I'm still getting over that break up, maybe I should just fake it till I make it. Really, I don't know.

> Maybe I'm still getting over that break up.

You almost certainly are. Fifteen years is a long time, longer than my parents were married. You didn't have a break-up; you went through a divorce. A year sounds like the minimum amount of time it would take a person to deal with it. I wish you the best.

I am sorry for your loss.