All the Lonely People

by Mike Gayle

When you don’t see someone regularly you imagine them carrying on with their lives as they’d always done from one year to the next, but the truth was things changed.

It was as if he’d been asleep for the past five years only to wake up in another world, in another reality where an entire generation had been wiped out and he was the sole survivor.

These days, like smoking in public, racism was less socially acceptable than it used to be and therefore more subtle.

Subtle Racism

Who asked eighty-two-year-old men anything other than whether they took their tea with one lump of sugar or two?

briefly enjoying the sweet relief the alcohol offered from his problems. At the same time, however, he was keenly aware that when the rum wore off, not only would his problems be there, but he would have a king-sized hangover to deal with too.

No, he wasn’t really in the mood for cake, company, or conversation, but he had to acknowledge that this was something he needed, even if it wasn’t necessarily what he wanted.

“I don’t make the rules.” “No, you don’t,” Hubert retorted, “but you go along with them just fine, which in my eyes makes you just as bad.”

“This is what love is. It’s a husband willing to work himself to death to provide for his family; it’s a child that is part me, part Hubert, and all wonderful.”

this cold stone building, which for all its stained glass and polished brass felt empty of the love of God.

maybe it was the English themselves that were the problem—their reserve, their fear of emotion, as though to express any, even at a time like this, would be shameful somehow.

Apparently, loneliness is a bigger killer than cancer.

It used to be that you belonged to a community, but really, is there such a thing anymore? Now it’s more like every man for himself.”

belonged to a community, but really, is there such a thing anymore? Now it’s more like every man for himself.”

thanks to Joyce and his children, he was seeing his country of birth through their eyes and not his own, seeing all the wonderful delights of rural Jamaica as if for the first time.

so, pressing the flowers briefly to his lips, he said quietly: “For you, my love.”

even now, nearly thirteen years on, he still missed her with every fiber of his being.

Because that’s what’s wrong with the world, isn’t it? Everyone’s always passing the buck or shifting the blame onto someone else.

Sometimes there are these long stretches of time where I feel like I don’t belong anywhere.

The room fell silent again and Hubert took the opportunity to think about the strangeness of life with its ebb and flow, people drifting in and out,

What did a social butterfly like her father know about the subject of loneliness?

The desire to protect her from the truth matched with the relief of no longer having to hide it.

He had learned over the past year that sometimes it was kinder to let her version of reality go unchallenged than to constantly be reminding her that she was wrong, that her brain was playing cruel tricks on her,

Agreed

“Me love you from the tips of your toes to the top of your head and what’s more, me always will.”

“It’s easy to waste a lot of time trying to think of a perfect solution to a problem. But sometimes the only thing you can do is cross your fingers and have a go.”

“Because she tired, Rose,” he answered. “She’s been fighting nearly ten years now, ten long years of this disease eating away at her. I know it’s hard, my love, the Lord knows it’s hard, but it’s time to let Mummy go.”

Caring for Joyce had been much more than a fulfillment of some sort of duty. Instead it had been a daily expression of his love for her, and he knew without a shadow of a doubt that she would have done the same for him had the tables been turned.

For the first time ever, he didn’t feel safe in his own home, and what made it worse was that he wasn’t sure he ever would again.

It was heartbreaking to see a life summed up by an empty room and tables full of untouched finger food,

I knew I had to do the same for you. I had to help you, even if you didn’t want to be helped. It’s just what friends do.”

“it’s not good for your… what them call it now… your mental health.

It’s not always easy, me know that, but you’ve got to be willing to keep doors open, to carry on trying even if it doesn’t look like it’s working. You’ve got to refuse to give up on people, even if them given up on themselves.”

Extraordinary things can happen to ordinary people like you and me, but only if we open ourselves up enough to let them.”

In fact, to choose to continue living was to honor the memory of those he had loved and lost, a celebration of the life they had once shared.