Lonely Grouse

Do you enjoy doing things by yourself?

By nature, writers need to be alone. Most days I’m happy-happy talking to myself in strange voices, running the dialog past my favorite critique partner, Jasmine Tea Schnauzer.

And then, I have a day like today. Call it mood. My husband, who usually fills the gas tank, leaves the car on empty. My oldest guilts me into letting her wear my new Keds to school. The characters in my book aren’t yelling loud enough for me to get them off the cliff where they’ve been hanging since Sunday.

I google people I knew in the ’80s. I find out. They’re dead. I obsess over my kids’ grades in the school’s, too convenient, Parent Portal. The meter reader passes through my fenced backyard, eight feet from the family room window. I check myself. I’m covered–albeit in a flannel pajama top and yoga pants. I scramble for cover, wondering if he’ll close the gate behind him. Will I remember before the dog runs out to chase a squirrel?

On this day, I’m a lonely grouse.

I have two choices.

A. Continue on the current path. Write nothing. Search Google for dead acquaintances. Hide out until late afternoon when I’m forced to think about school pick-up and dinner prep. By this time, I’ll be raving, cracked, and depraved.

Or

B. Get the hell out of Dodge.

Opting for B.

Do you like to be alone or are you a lonely grouse, too?