My wife has decided she needs to go back to Kentucky to help her mom again. I mentioned in an earlier post that she had fallen and broken her arm. My wife went to check on her and help her out some after it happened. She felt bad when she left, Her mom has a doctor’s appointment Thursday so my wife is leaving today to go stay with her again for at least ten days and go to the appointment with her.
This means I am starting another stretch of life as a hermit. The last hermit stretch I let myself get depressed over the alone time. I went to a “fellowship” dinner at my church to be around people and no one talked to me the entire time. It reminded me that being around other people can be more lonely than being lonely alone. I’ve decided this time I will try to embrace my time alone more.
Some ideas to survive my time alone:
Spend more time outside – another walk at the nature preserve, yard work around the house, walking the dog.
Chores – When she told me she was going to Kentucky, I pushed all of the household chores that could wait until this week. If I cross one thing off a to-do list each day I won’t feel like I am wasting my time.
Zebra hunting – There are zebras loose in a nearby county. I might take a drive to the area to see if I can spot them.
Food trucks – I’m picking my daughter up from campus Thursday night so we can do food truck night together. This is not a hermit activity.
Sports – I will have a week of Braves baseball on TV. The Kentucky basketball scrimmage is on Friday night. The Ravens game is on Sunday afternoon. Hopefully, there will be more Braves baseball next week.
Books – I need to read more. I keep letting myself get distracted. Time alone might help with this.
TV – I have shows to catch up on on the DVR. I have streaming shows I want to try when I run out of DVRed shows.
Writing – I am working on building my audience on Medium so they don’t kick me out of the partners’ program. I have a list of places that will pay for book reviews. I might apply to write for them. I will keep blogging here.
Hopefully, all of this will help me make it through the days without letting the depression get the best of me.
The World's Common Tater 
Good luck!
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Thanks!
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Zebra hunting! Zebra hunting. Seriously!! Can you I,aging all the stories you can get out of that!! Plus…it’s zebra hunting without the actual hunting part!
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I figure at the very least I get out I the house and I get a post out of it
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Clearly!!
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Sounds like you have a good plan to keep yourself feeling good. Sometimes being alone is a gift.
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I do enjoy some time alone. I just have to deal with my thoughts going to bad places.
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I understand that. My daughter has depression and she starts ruminating on destructive thoughts.
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That’s a good list of things to do. It will certainly keep your mind occupied. I’ll be interested in hearing about your zebra adventure. Did you see that they found one of them dead with its leg in a snare, on private property owned by the Girl Scouts? That’s not a very scout-like thing.
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I saw they had found one dead. I didn’t hear it was on girl scout property
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I think it was in a Post article, but I could be wrong. It could have been on my NPR feed.
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I probably skimmed over it in a Post article
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And now I can’t find the reference to Girl Scout property. Maybe that was unconfirmed at the time of writing and has since been proved false, so they took it out of the story. Maybe I imagined it, but I’m not that creative.
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Maybe the Girl Scouts have more power than we think and had it scrubbed
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Seems like you have a good list here. “Being lonely around people is more lonely than being lonely alone.” (I’m paraphrasing). Yea, that can be true unfortunately. I’m sorry you’ve experienced that; I am all too familiar with that feeling…
Zebra hunting sounds fun though. If you find any, you might consider taking a picture and sharing it here (if permitted). I think that’d be cool. Sending hugs!
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I will definitely post a picture here if I find a zebra p
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