"How To Be Alone," a beautiful poem by Tanya Davis, turned into a video by Andrea Dorfman. I spend an awful lot of time alone — alone at the office, writing; alone in a hotel, catching up on email on tour (greetings from beautiful Braunschweig!). I like being on my own mostly, though there are times in groups when there's that amazing wonderful nigh-telepathic connection to a big conversation when I am mildly poleaxed by the realization that there's something to this "other people" stuff.
When you are comfortable with eat lunch and run, take yourself out for dinner. A restaurant with linen and silverware. You're no less intriguing a person when you're eating solo dessert to cleaning the whipped cream from the dish with your finger. In fact some people at full tables will wish they were where you were.
Go to the movies. Where it is dark and soothing. Alone in your seat amidst a fleeting community.
And then, take yourself out dancing to a club where no one knows you. Stand on the outside of the floor till the lights convince you more and more and the music shows you. Dance like no one's watching…because, they're probably not. And, if they are, assume it is with best of human intentions. The way bodies move genuinely to beats is, after all, gorgeous and affecting. Dance until you're sweating, and beads of perspiration remind you of life's best things, down your back like a brook of blessings.
(via Kottke)
