At the same time, I find it easy to project that desire too far. I get less solitude than I would like now, so I feel that need, but I definitely don't want infinite solitude. While I liked living alone, I also remember getting quite lonely at times. It's easy for me to take for granted my social needs because they are being (more than) met right now.
One thing I do find a real challenge is a life that feels both socially full and shallow. With all of the tasks of being a full-time employee and parent today, my social calendar fills up quickly. I can really only see a couple of people a week. Kid birthday parties and other events like that overwhelm it. Because my kids are constantly making new friends, there is this parade of parents that enter and recede from my life. They're all nice people, but over time it gets harder to invest effort into friendship with them because I only see any given one of them every couple of months and even that may fade if our kids stop being friends. Not quite the "single serving friends" of Fight Club, but close.
At the same time, it's hard for me to maintain my own independent friendships on top of those acquaintances because there just isn't that much time. If I've already got a birthday party on Saturday and a playdate on Sunday, it's really hard to enjoy another social activity with my own friends on top of that. Even with people I consider close friends, I sometimes only see them once every couple of months.
I try to be mindful that this phase won't last forever. As my kids get older, they'll do more drop-off parties and eventually will get to their own social functions without me at all. They'll want less of my time until one day I'll wake up and the nest will be empty. I try to enjoy this time for what it is while it lasts.
My biggest worry is that by the time the kids are older and I have more room for my own close friends, those bonds will have withered along with my skills at socializing and I'll fail to reinvigorate them.
My kids sometimes feel too needy. Oftentimes I never get the desired downtime.
My wife got mad at me one day and said "You need to listen to Harry Chapin's Cat's in the Cradle. Then come talk with me." It's a shock to listen to that song, because it's true. It would be easy to end up like that and no one want it.
Each of those ages are incredible and filled with irreplaceable experiences. It's easy to get jaded when you move through them so slowly.
"You know, I feel like having a me day. I'll hand this one off to 60-year-old me."
My 60-year-old self magically time travels in and has a blast with the kids he hasn't seen as children in decades. Meanwhile I get to relax. Then, twenty years from now, when the nest is cold and empty, the memories of my kids' childhood is fading, and I long to feel their little arms wrapped around me, I get zipped back in time to live a whole day of it afresh.
They say youth is wasted on the young. Sometimes it feels like parenting is wasted on young parents too.
It's a very challenging balancing act especially in today's America which expects parents to spend tons of time with their kids.
Do you think that could at all be attributed that you are actually more alone now?
What I mean is, most families aren't interacting much with people outside their immediate family, whereas in the past the extended family was around and built a support system for those immediate families. If you had your parents, siblings, cousins, etc... around, you might actually have more time to recharge because child rearing wouldn't exclusively be put on the shoulders of the parents.
The way that our kids are raised now is incredibly different than the way I was raised. Although predominately raised by my parents, my grandparents, aunts, great aunts, etc... all had an influence and played a part in that upbringing due to the geographics of where everyone lived.
Aside from going out and physically isolating yourself, having family around usually doesn’t help.
Now family could help looking after the kids when you take time away, but once your kids can stay aline for a few hours, having more people taking care of them might not help that much (now you’re managing a fleet of care givers, creating a “too many cooks” situation)
That was my first thought, as well - I have a wife and two teenaged kids, and they drain absolutely all of my free time. I keep reminding myself that I should be taking advantage and enjoying this time that I have to spend with them because in a few years, they’ll be away and I won’t see them very often, but I do feel like I would like just an hour here and there to pick what channel to watch and not have to debate about it. I wonder if I’ll feel differently when I finally get to that point, though - I am sure that I’m going to miss my kids when they move away, because I already miss having little kids running around the house (even though they sort of drove me crazy at the time then, too).
For me, I think that frustration's the source of my "oh god just drop me on a deserted island with some books and leave me" fantasies. I'd rather be around my kids and enjoying high-quality parent-kid time because it actually is pretty great, but that's so rarely and unpredictably available that the loner route becomes more appealing.
Recently I watched the Liam Neeson version of "Cold Pursuit".
In its honesty and humor, both of which I appreciate to no end, Neeson's character's wife opines in grief on their dead son. "Did you even know his favorite movie? All of those hunting trips, what did you talk about?!?"
"... Hunting."
So very true and honest in many respects.
My hunting trips are just day trips. I'm not like some guys I know who fly to Colorado and Alaska, leaving the family behind. I want my sons to be involved, but they are not quite ready. My wife will sit in a deer stand with me and like to shoot, but will not shoot at animals. She likes the resulting venison, however.
Our early ancestors hunted in parties of several to dozens of men, often for safety against predators, both two and four legged. I like the idea the British use, several people driving birds, a good hunt, and cigars and gin and tonics afterwards in the game room. Done it. It's great.
I also don’t think the person you replied to was doing down hunting as a social activity but that the movie makes it a stand in for anything done to avoid that social activity.
The problem is that for many, there is a trend where social life is hard to obtain for several reasons.
We become people who need help once again later in life.
If you ever find such a magical place again, please let me know if they're hiring!
I certainly don’t, I chose the office with no windows on the opposite side the building to everyone else with the lights out and the AC cranked to the max I’m happy.
I have a small led desk lamp so I don’t walk into things and that’s it.
Editing to say that schools are now offering summer sports, which I hate, because it means less time in the evenings to relax after work. American culture is too busy. Too many games, too many expectations of parents to commit to this and that. Too many schools begging for money when I already pay taxes. It goes on and on...
Some people need lots of social engagement; I don't. I don't like parties. I do like two or three couples over for a BBQ and beer. It's intimate enough, but controllable enough that there are not competing voices in the background.
At work, I'm fortunate to be able to keep the lights out in my office, draw the blinds and stream my psytrance while working. My colleague I office with likes the same things, so it's a win-win for us. People think we're weird that we like it dark, but I've never worked in an IT office where the lights were preferred. I think this may be an IT thing. I also dearly miss when IT was in the data center and not accessible to the general office staff.