Alone

author's note. This facts of this are true, nothing has been embellished.

Alone

“I want to be alone.”

“Leave me alone.”

People use expressions like that a lot, but do they really know what it's like to be alone. To feel like the world has turned its back on you. Where you feel like there is no one to turn to. Alone is a bleak, dismal world. The hopelessness and despair draw you into the black hole of depression.

I have been alone, and this is my story...

I was in love with Lisa, head over heels. Totally in love. For the first time in my life, I felt happy. And then it all came crashing down. It was over. No fight, no disagreement. She simply wanted to move on with her life, and there was no place for me in that life.

The bottom came crashing out of my world. It was early December. It was cold and bleak outside, and that matched my mood. My reason for living had left. I felt I had no purpose. I had no friends. I was several thousand miles away from any family, and not that it mattered, I was estranged from them.

My days were spent drinking coffee in the restaurant of the bar where I worked with a band. At night I would sit at the mixing board and control the sound. After the bar closed, I'd walk home, and read until I passed out.

The despair was terrible, I began to have thoughts of killing myself. I fantasized about using the .308 Winchester, just put the barrel in my mouth, and pull the trigger.  I tasted the end of the rifle several times, I still remember the taste of cold steel and and the tang of the gun oil.  In a moment of sanity, I took my rifles and sold them at a pawn shop.

The days passed. One after another. Nothing really changed. One day was much like the one night before, empty and devoid of any joy.

Christmas Eve. The bar closed early. I went home. I drank myself asleep, alone. Christmas morning. No presents. No laughter. No phone calls. Silence. I was alone. I wanted to die. I wanted the pain and the hurting to end. I am sure if I hadn't had sold the rifles, I would used one of them. What probably saved me was I got hungry. The only place I thought was open was the Sally Ann, and I ate Christmas dinner there. The despair was still there, but I was full of turkey and fell asleep.

The next day, I got a call from some friends in Alaska, they needed some help, and wanted to come and do sound for their band. Early on the morning of January 1st. I packed some clothes in a suitcase and walked away from my apartment. I left everything there, I simply walked away from my life.

It was minus 32 in Whitehorse. I got to Kodiak, it was 53 and raining. I thought I had died and gone to heaven.