Hi, You’re Bored and Lonely Today?

Maybe there’s a solution lurking behind the problem

This is a true story.

I was asked, three days ago, to visit a casual friend — I’ll call her Sally — because several mutual friends said she was increasingly isolated and spoke of being bored and lonely. This came up when three of us had serendipitously met while walking the city streets. (It’s hard to be bored and lonely on an urban walk. Or any kind of walk, for that matter.)

So I called Sally, and asked if I could drop by because I hadn’t seen her since last year. Wayyy last year. She agreed, and we set a date for this morning.

Sally is in her early 70s, a retired nurse, a widow with two grown children who live many miles away. We became friends while working at an interfaith shelter several decades ago, something I still do although Sally dropped off of that list some years before the pandemic. We’ve kept in intermittent touch, though I admit to not having called or emailed or encountered her since a lunch with mutual friends early in 2023.

I was barely in the door before feeling a little gloomy.

Sally lives in a two-bedroom apartment she bought with her husband about 30 years ago, and it definitely belongs to an earlier age. Nothing wrong with earlier ages, but for one thing the gauzy 1980s sheers dimmed the light (not to mention the interesting view) outside the front windows; other windows had less light and no scenic views. There were books and tchotchkes but no flowers, or scribbled-on notepads by the phone, or half-finished magazines (at my place it’s old-fashioned newspapers.) Quite possibly she lives in the bedroom, I thought; still, the entry and living room just showed no signs of life.

I was not on a rescue mission. Rescue missions are for people who know how to rescue; I was just there to hold out a hand.

“So, tell me how you’re doing,” I said, after we traded hugs and she offered tea. “Let’s go out instead,” I suggested hopefully, “I’ll buy.” “Mmmm, no thanks. I look like a wreck.”

“You look good to me,” I said truthfully. She was stylishly dressed in jeans and sweater. “But okay. Tell me how you’re doing.”

“Do you really want to know?” she replied.

“Yes,” I said. “I really want to know. Seriously.”

“I’m bored, and somewhat lonely,” she said. “I get tired when I go out. It’s probably my fault that I don’t see people much, because I’ve had some disagreements. But the things I used to do just got old. So I’m bored and, I guess you’d say, lonely. I’m not on antidepressants because I don’t feel depressed. I’m just bored.”

For the record, I am about two decades older than Sally. Boredom and loneliness are not my problems; overcommitment is. But despite having promised myself I wouldn't try to fix Sally’s problems, I couldn't resist at least a try.

“Well, you’d still be welcome at the shelter,” I ventured. “It’s never boring over there.” Sally laughed, and for a while we traded shelter stories. I was not convinced, however, that I had effected a miracle cure and she showed no enthusiasm for re-joining that particular fray.

We talked books. We’re both readers. Can a reader ever be bored? Actually, Sally said she feels guilty sitting around reading all day. Guilt I understand; guilt about reading too much? I wasn’t going to touch that. “Makes me feel like a slug,” were her exact words. I understand slug too; my inner slug is omnipresent. When I’m reading I tell it to go slug itself.

We talked politics. Our political leanings are pretty closely aligned, so I mentioned a couple of nonprofits for which I send get-out-the-vote letters or postcards in support of candidates.

“You know,” Sally said; “it just makes me too angry. I can’t watch TV news any more. I follow stuff in papers and magazines but anything more — and I don’t do news on social media at all — just raises my blood pressure. Suppose some of those voters you’re writing vote for are the wrong candidate?”

“Well, that’s democracy,” I said. “But I suspect these organizations are trying to get out votes among voters you and I would agree with.” Sally did not ask for web addresses of any of my friendly groups.

I asked about her daughters, one of whom lives in an oceanside town that’s had flood problems lately, which led to this opening:

We talked about climate change. I mentioned an upcoming panel discussion at the nearby Commonwealth Club that’s featuring several nationally prominent writers and climate activists. Because I’m volunteering for that event, I told Sally I’d give her my extra ticket if she wanted to meet me there. She said that sounded interesting, she’d let me know. (I’m not holding my breath.)

Is there a moral to this story? Maybe.

If you don’t like sunlight in your windows; if you’ve had disagreements and don’t want to bother mending relationships; if you’re disinclined to volunteer for good causes; if you’re too mad about politics to try to change anything; and if reading too many books makes you feel like a slug . . . you might wind up feeling bored and lonely.

Or you might need antidepressants.