Living Alone In The Era Of Social Distancing

“I love your mask!”

I’m not sure what was weirder about this overheard exchange at the pharmacy: the fact that we’re now complimenting each other on the adorableness of our surgical-grade face masks, or that this was the only human contact I’d had for days. My friend Natasha understands — her only recent human sightings have been of essential employees, too. Like me, Natasha is living alone in the era of social distancing.

“It’s definitely been weird,” she said in a recent phone conversation.

In the spirit of full disclosure, I do have a significant other who visits me periodically (we never interact with anyone else). When I mention some mild finger-pointing I have encountered from married Facebook friends about these visits, Natasha, who is single by choice, dismisses this with a laugh. Cohabitators don’t quite understand. From inside their lively, sometimes chaotic homes, they may not have even noticed the dystopian silence on the streets outside.

“During the day, I’m usually not aware of it; when I’m at work, I’m in my office and I tend not to see that many people anyway,” Natasha said. “At the end of the day, though, I notice how quiet it gets outside now. It’s completely silent.” Natasha is not a lonely person. She has a good job, possesses a wide circle of friends, and is a double threat of musical and artistic talent. She volunteers for an animal shelter. She doesn’t need a relationship to make her life complete.

Yet even for the most autonomous of us, being on indefinite lockdown and seeing no humans except for the occasional masked stranger is surreal, to say the least.

“I think it’s because it’s involuntary,” she said. “Even though I’m independent and used to living alone, I’m realizing that suddenly, it’s not up to me when I get to see other people. That’s the part that’s kind of frightening.”

To a large extent, it is this lack of choice that is most disorienting to singles adhering to social distancing, according to Bella DePaulo, PhD, a social scientist and author of Singled Out: How Singles Are Stereotyped, Stigmatized and Ignored, and Still Live Happily Ever After.

“The time alone is imposed, rather than chosen,” DePaulo said. “People like to have a choice about how they are living, and single people — perhaps especially single people who are single at heart — value their freedom and autonomy even more than other people do.”