Case Study on Loneliness
By Oh Young-jin
Assistant Managing Editor
I don't intend to emulate Nietzsche or Freud but the advent of spring tempts one to be a two-bit philosopher, or do some psychobabble. Adding to the mix is a string of suicides by entertainers against the gloomy background of an economic slump.
So, I take loneliness as the subject of my brief study, with its purpose being to find ways of taming this failing with which all humans are born.
Chemically speaking, the cause may be a drastic seasonal change that triggers an upset in the testosterone-estrogen balance, or something of which I am entirely unaware. I wouldn't claim to be privy to this scientific nature involving the feeling of loneliness.
My mundane diagnosis is that loneliness can come in various shapes and colors. Here are some samples.
The first is the loneliness with the shape of a pair of parallels in the color of blue. I choose parallels because they are destined to go in the same direction, but with no chance of convergence. The blue color is given because it signifies melancholy that can't be separated from man.
Perhaps Orson Welles from Citizen Kane well captured the spirit, when he said, ``We are born alone, live alone and die alone. Only through our love and friendship can we create the illusion for the moment that we're not alone.''
The blue loneliness in the shape of parallels is one that you feel as you go to bed, knowing that you end up being alone for the night while lying in bed with your loved one, or when you try to find somebody else to speak to, not being comfortable with ones with whom you feel close.
It can occur during an early morning subway ride to work or on a late night flight to New York. Some seats are left empty, making one anxious in the hope that somebody will come soon and take them. Perhaps it is a moment when man feels the incompleteness of being a human being, stuck with the impossible mission of Sisyphus.
The second kind of loneliness comes in the shape of a rectangle with the color of green.
This happens when you feel alone and are overwhelmed by loneliness, although you are part of a crowd. I give it the green color thinking of a summer mountain dense with vegetation and full of life. The rectangle is adopted because it is a figure more complete than a parallel, but less so than a circle.
I am sure that there are times when you feel lonely, even in the company of your friends. You speak with them or react to their remarks, but your mind is somewhere else. Perhaps you light up a cigarette, or brush your teeth, for a three-minute friendship as a substitute for what your friends can't provide.
This green loneliness occurs as you feel as if you walked down a deserted back alley, when you are actually fighting the crash of a large crowd in Myeongdong. Being so close to people, but feeling thousands of miles away at the same time, is the essence of it.
The third kind of loneliness is what one can feel in sympathy for others. In other words, you feel lonely because you know somebody else is feeling lonelier than you. For instance, it applies to the recent death of an actress.
Despite all kinds of rumors about her suicide, I see her cause of death as boiling down to the one human failing ― the insatiable feeling of being alone without the chance of overcoming the accompanied loneliness.
This loneliness takes the shape of a circle, not because it is complete by itself but aspires to be so. Yellow is the color I choose for its sympathetic nature.
I was not sure about why other people felt lonely until recently, when my alter ego told me of his story. He said that he blurted out a confession to his wife. ``I feel extremely lonely. The pain is so acute that I feel as if a pound of flesh was cut away from my inner thighs and valves in the pump in my heart were half closed.''
``Many people do'' was his wife's answer.
He said that he didn't carry on with the conversation because her simple answer enlightened him, not with something new, but with the confirmation of what he already knew. That is, loneliness may be an incurable, hereditary illness, and people have to live with it for the rest of their lives. A consolation is that you are not alone with it, so be brave and have faith in life. There are two choices ― one is to succumb to this illness and live a life enslaved to it, or be a matador and pierce a lance into the heart of this beast.
Then again, don't over-kill it because it also acts as a stimulant to a boring life, giving you a chance to appreciate its beauty.