David McElroy

I miss having someone to miss.

Loving someone can be a paradox. It can be the most rewarding experience of your life, and it can also be the most miserable experience of your life. But there’s something powerful and life-giving about being in love, even in those times which bring deep hurt.

Nearly five years ago, I wrote something one night when I was in the depths of a painful experience of longing for a woman who I missed. It’s not especially well-written, but it’s raw and honest, which has made it my most-read article for the last few years. A lot of people seem to read it late at night, and I get a lot of email from people either thanking me for reassuring them they weren’t alone or else begging for my advice.

At the time, I was deeply in love with a woman who I desperately wanted back in my life. My need for her was painful. It hurt to want someone back so badly, but I still had hope — so there was constant tension in my life. I was in terrible pain from missing her, but I believed the pain would be worthwhile in the end — because I believed in her and I believed she would return.

Tonight, I feel something different. I don’t feel longing or even the pain of loving someone I can’t have. I feel the emptiness of being alone — but it’s different now, because I don’t have love or hope for a particular woman to focus on.

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I wasn’t even supposed to be in the class. I was a sophomore at the University of Alabama and I was taking a creative writing class that was supposed to be reserved for seniors and grad students.

The instructor was a stern older man with a long history as a published literary author. I had been required to get his permission to sign up for the class — and he was dubious about whether I was ready for the work. It turned out he was right and I was wrong.

There are basically two kinds of writers, to oversimplify quite a bit. There’s the literary kind, the type who write fiction and creative writing that leaves you feeling as though you’ve had an experience with art. And there’s the kind who are really good at communicating information in a straightforward way. That includes journalists and most essayists and even technical writers.

The instructor was the literary type. I was the informational type.

My newspaper training had made me really good at writing clear and concise accounts of events. I could even write opinions well. But I was terrified when given the chance to take a chance on literary writing. After a few sessions of the class, I got scared and dropped the course.

I’ve realized recently that I am at the point in life at which I have to make the transition — from glorified copy boy to making actual art — that I was afraid to make back then. It still scares me.

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Most people sense something is wrong.

They may not have language for it. They may not be able to explain it. But beneath the distractions, beneath the noise, beneath the endless scrolling and entertainment, there is a quiet unease — a feeling that something foundational has slipped.

We were told we were building the most advanced civilization in history. Scientific. Rational. Enlightened. Smarter than every generation that came before us.

So why does it feel so fragile?

For years, I believed the solution was better arguments. If something was wrong, it could be explained. If people misunderstood reality, clearer reasoning would fix it. If the culture drifted into confusion, the answer was more clarity.

I grew up believing in the power of direct language and linear logic. Declarative sentences. Cause and effect. If something was true, you could prove it.

But somewhere along the way, I began to notice that proof didn’t change much.

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