Eating Alone
Alone . . . Together
On any given day, a quarter of all US adults eat all their meals alone. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Alone.
This is a 50% increase in the past 20 years — a rate highest among young adults under 35 and, rather obviously, those who live alone. Nearly 70% of people who live alone eat all their meals solo.
How many people live alone? Nearly 30% in the United States. That number has tripled since World War II and parallels what is called the epidemic of loneliness, which the US Surgeon General has flagged as being as harmful as smoking 15 cigarettes per day for half of the US population who experience chronic loneliness.
Why am I sharing this?
I live alone. I eat about 90% of my meals by myself — both at home and while traveling. Yet, I am a social eater. I generally eat better, more happily, and more adventurously when I eat with others.
In my tiny 300-square-foot home, I do not own a table. (I do, it should be noted, own a desk.) I mostly eat while standing at the kitchen sink, though I sometimes sit on my sofa with my computer. Mostly, I snack while in constant motion. Eating at home is a duty, not a pleasure.
As we approach another new year, I am setting an intention to change my approach toward eating.
But how?
Interestingly, one of my favorite things to do is going out to eat. Alone. When I tell people this, they usually look at me like I’ve suggested slowly removing all my toenails with a rusty, sharp object. They are shocked when I say how much I adore everything about eating out alone at a restaurant. “But isn’t everyone staring at you, feeling sorry for you?” they ask.
Not that I’ve noticed, I tell them. But maybe that’s because I don’t feel sorry for myself.
Vacation Village
When I was a little girl, my parents and I used to take weekend road trips to Vacation Village in San Diego.
Set on its own island in Mission Bay, Vacation Village opened in 1962 — the same year I was born — as a modernist, utopian tropical escape replete with lagoons, waterfalls, tropical landscaping, and artifacts like tikis and lava lamps.
Vacation Village was the perfect place for my older parents (my father was 51 and my mother 45 when I was born), who loved visiting Tijuana and La Jolla and the San Diego Zoo, to come with their only child, who could make friends at one of the many resort pools or activities and be cared for in the evenings by an available babysitter.
But the babysitter was never hired during the day, and one morning, I must have been particularly irritating, probably shot from a cannon with excitement about going somewhere or doing something, when all my parents wanted was a quiet morning with room service.
That’s when they came up with their “brilliant idea”.
“You know how much you love having breakfast in the restaurant and reading the newspaper?” they said (I say they because I don’t remember who it was, exactly, though I would guess it was my mother.)
I nodded.
“Well, we have a special treat for you. You can go have breakfast all by yourself this morning. Give the maitre d’ our room number, and order anything you want. Pancakes or French toast. Read the comics and the sports pages. Just like a grown-up. At the end, sign the bill and be sure to add a tip.” They even explained how to do that.
Well, that sounded pretty darn good to me.
“And while you’re there,” my mother added, “be sure to look around. One of the best parts about eating out is people-watching. Come back and tell us what you saw!”
That’s how it all started.
People Who Need People
My father’s favorite song came from the musical, Funny Girl, about his dear friend Fanny Brice. He would constantly quote the lyric, “People who need people are the luckiest people in the world.”
My father spent large portions of every year alone on the road, where he often found himself eating alone. He would happily invite total strangers to sit down with him — and always loved chatting with whomever he was seated next to on a plane.
My mother loved people every bit as much as my father — but when it came to strangers, she preferred to observe them. I’ll never forget one flight we took together to Hawaii, where she worked as an architectural designer.
I was about to go to the ladies’ room when she stopped me.
“As you walk through the cabin,” she said, “I want you to look around. You’ve been to Hawaii so many times, but there are people on this plane who have dreamed of this flight their whole lives. They are finally going to Paradise. I want you to walk through that cabin and imagine what it feels like to them. How excited they must be. All the plans they have for their vacations.”
I’ll never forget the palpable joy I felt on that plane. I came back to my seat with a huge smile on my face — and from then on, I began observing people as my mother did. When I go to a restaurant alone, I am always listening and looking. I have overheard the most amazing conversations — funny, sad, hopeful, curious. I have watched the dynamics between couples, families, friends, and the wait staff.
But I’m also my father’s daughter — and I often end up in fascinating conversations with fellow diners or servers, coming away with a new friend, or a great suggestion for something to do in the area.
I love eating alone, because it reminds me that I am never alone.
A Person Who Needs People
People do need people. Even those of us who enjoy our own company need other people. We all need each other, which is something the folks in power seem to have forgotten. Every single one of us on this planet has a role to play in the well-being of others. But for those of us who live and spend inordinate amounts of time alone, how do we feel that connection when we are alone?
I certainly can’t afford to eat out all the time. Nor do I want to. But I am fed up with wolfing food down quickly and unconsciously. I want to find the same presence and joy in eating at home alone as I do at a restaurant.
Those two words are the key: presence and joy.
Often, when I am preparing my dog’s meal, which includes various ingredients and supplements, I can’t remember if I’ve already added this or that. I’ve been distracted, thinking about something else. Yesterday, I dumped a tablespoon of green powder that I was supposed to mix with water and portion out in teaspoons straight into her food. I had to throw away the whole meal — a huge waste of money.
I worry about messing up things for my dog, but not for me.
That’s gotta stop.
Changing the Tapes
Recently, I read something fascinating about the human brain.
Beginning in our thirties, our brains stop seeking new information and increasingly operate using old “recordings” — relying on past behaviors to form comfortable patterns that encourage us to keep doing things the way we’ve been doing them.
This is why travel, moving, or starting a new job can feel both stressful and exhilarating.
When I go out to eat, the old recording tells me that this will be fun. This gets me to go. But each new restaurant, menu, and cast of characters forces me to switch off the old tapes and be really present right where I am. In other words, I am creating a new recording instead of just sliding into an old familiar groove.
So, what I need to do is find new ways to feel connected to food, to ritual, to presence, and even to people — even when I’m alone.
But perhaps it’s different for you. You might love making delicious homemade meals. Perhaps you pour yourself a lovely cup of coffee and enjoy it with a muffin from your favorite bakery while reading or looking out at your garden. Yet the idea of eating out alone would cause hives.
We all need to change things up.
Most of us need to find new ways to be present and feel connected. For me, it’s when I eat at home. But what about you? Would you be willing to eat out alone?
Before you say, hell no, think about this.
Alone vs Lonely
What is the difference between alone and lonely?
Alone means not in the physical presence of others whereas loneliness is a feeling of isolation, disconnection, sadness, and even depression.
The irony, of course, is that we’re all more “connected” than ever. Someone burps in Budapest or giggles in Guangzhou, and we see it in real time. So, why do so many of us feel so disconnected?
Two hundred years ago, most people lived in places (villages, homes, tenements) where they were related to more people than they could count on two hands. That’s no longer true. This is why creating family where we find it, as I wrote a few weeks ago, is so vital. Because connection is the key to our well-being.
That’s why I started blogging again.
I began my Daily Practice of Joy blog over a decade ago because my readers held me accountable to show up to my practice of joy every single day, particularly when I didn’t want to.
With this blog, I hope to take things a step further. I want it to hold us all accountable.
Although I don’t write this blog as I would a letter, I do always imagine you reading it. I imagine an idea that has come through me resonating in you. An idea you might share with someone else. An idea that connects us.
When I eat alone at a restaurant, I don’t sit down with strangers and shoehorn myself into their supper. But I am definitely not eating alone. I feel a connection to the place, the people, the food — and those connections live on in my memory.
At home, when I have to eat, however, I shut all that down.
Together
As we move toward the new year, I would like to share a few intentions about eating alone.
I want to be more present, more joyful, and more connected, no matter where I’m eating.
I want to invoke gratitude for food.
I want to prepare more meals with joy.
I want to learn how to be a better cook by trying things that I’m intimidated to make.
I want to say yes when people ask me to join them for a meal. And I want to ask people to join me.
But mostly, when I’m eating alone at home, I want to feel about eating the way I do about this blog — that I’m never alone. That we really are all in this together.
Will you join me?
For those of us who eat alone, shall we eat alone together?
I’ll let you know how it goes, if you’ll do the same.
If that’s not saying grace, I don’t know what is. . .
Reading this as I eat my lentils and rice for breakfast. Alone. Great food for thought here. (I couldn't resist.) I love this piece and all of your memories recorded.
I eat alone most of the time and often think of a movie quote (can't remember which movie and this is paraphrasing) "I'm divorced. I eat alone. Leaning over the sink!" I have got into the habit of eating standing up, near the fridge or taking bites in between bits of washing-up. But I am going to take your lead and try and eat more mindfully. At the table! Let's do this thing!