The Art of Organized Chaos

The unexpected lessons that come from living alone for the first time after 36 years of sharing life with other people.

Readers, I have a confession.

It has been almost three years since I left my marriage, and I still do not think I have completely figured out how to live alone.

Now, before some of you start rolling your eyes and saying, “Sarah, it has been three years. How have you not figured this out yet?” let me present some evidence in my defense.

I lived with another person or people for the first thirty-six years of my life.

36!

When you look at it that way, three years suddenly doesn’t seem like nearly enough time.

I graduated high school and went straight to college where I had roommates. After college, I moved back home for about a year. Then I moved in with my ex-husband. For thirty-six years there was always another person somewhere in the background of my day. There was another voice in the house, another schedule to consider, another set of habits and routines woven into everyday life. I never had to think about what it meant to truly live alone because I never actually did it.

Then one day I found myself doing exactly that.

I don’t think I was prepared for how strange it would feel. Everyone talks about the big things when you leave a marriage. They talk about grief and healing and rebuilding your life. What nobody talks about are the weird little moments. The moments when you walk through the front door after work and realize there isn’t another person on the other side of it. The moments when there is no television playing in another room, no conversation happening in the kitchen, no one asking how your day was or what you want for dinner.

For the first time in my life, it was just me.

Those first few months were harder than I knew how to explain at the time. The silence felt enormous. I used to leave the television on constantly, not because I was watching it, but because I wanted voices in the apartment. I wanted background noise. I wanted proof that I wasn’t completely alone. Even sleeping felt strange. I had spent so many years falling asleep beside another person that laying in a completely quiet apartment felt unnatural.

Looking back, I realize I wasn’t just learning how to live alone. I was learning who I was when there wasn’t another person automatically factored into every decision.

What did I want for dinner?

What did I want to do on a Saturday?

What kind of home did I want to create?

Did I want music playing? Television? Silence?

Those sound like small questions, but when you’ve spent years making decisions as part of a partnership, suddenly having complete freedom can feel overwhelming. I know that sounds ridiculous because freedom is supposed to be exciting. And it was. But it was also intimidating. For the first time, every decision belonged entirely to me.

I also learned that there is a huge difference between being alone and being lonely.

Lonely was those first months after I left. Lonely was wondering if I had completely blown up my life. Lonely was grieving the future I thought I was going to have and then looking around and realizing that a chapter that had lasted more than a decade was over.

Being alone feels different.

Being alone is what came later.

Being alone is coming home after work and genuinely enjoying the quiet. It’s spending an evening by yourself and not feeling like something is missing. It’s realizing that the apartment no longer feels empty. It feels peaceful.

That took time.

More time than I expected.

I have routines now. Not impressive routines. Nobody is going to feature me in one of those videos where someone wakes up at 4:30 in the morning, drinks lemon water, journals for forty-five minutes, and somehow becomes a millionaire before breakfast. My routines are much less glamorous.

But they are mine.

And Readers, I make my bed every day now. I know. Please try to remain calm. Some of you have probably been doing that since you were six years old. Well, Congratulations, Brenda. We are all very proud of you. For me, though, that is progress. There was a time when simply getting through the day felt like enough. Now I make my bed before work and come home to a room that feels cared for. It seems like such a small thing, but sometimes rebuilding your life happens through small things.

The same can be said for Rainbow Sanctuary 2.0.

I am still figuring out what I want my home to look like. Yes, it is rainbow themed, but if we are being completely honest, my decorating strategy has mostly been finding something rainbow, becoming emotionally attached to it, purchasing it immediately, and then putting it wherever there happens to be room. I keep telling myself I need a vision. A plan. A cohesive aesthetic. Instead, I appear to be building a collection of colorful objects and hoping they eventually organize themselves into an interior design style.

The apartment also contains bags of clothes that I never unpacked after moving in eight months ago. I could unpack them. I know how. I simply continue finding other things I would rather do. Future Sarah has been assigned that task repeatedly. Unfortunately, Future Sarah keeps becoming Present Sarah and she remains equally unmotivated.

Then there is the cooking situation.

I know how to cook. I would like that entered into the historical record. I used to cook all the time. Full meals. Desserts. Holiday dinners. The problem isn’t that I can’t cook. The problem is that cooking for one person feels completely different. Most recipes seem designed for either a family of four or a small military operation. I don’t need twelve servings of anything. I need dinner tonight and maybe lunch tomorrow if I remember to take it to work. More often than not, the air fryer wins, pre-chopped vegetables save the day, and DoorDash stands ready for emergency assistance.

Cleaning is another mystery I have yet to solve. I genuinely do not know how often normal adults are cleaning certain things or how they manage to keep homes looking like nobody has ever actually lived in them. Fortunately, I found a solution that works for me. I hired house cleaners. They come once a month and honestly it seems like money well spent. Could I spend an entire Saturday cleaning? Sure. Could I spend that Saturday with my boys, drinking iced coffee, going on an adventure, or attending a concert instead? Also yes. So I outsourced the problem.

Don’t judge me, Readers. You’re just jealous.

The funny thing is that when I look around my apartment now, I realize none of these things are really the point. The unpacked bags, the rainbow clutter, the air fryer dinners, the house cleaners. They are all just evidence of the same thing: I am still learning.

I am still learning how to build a life that belongs entirely to me.

The apartment isn’t perfect. It probably never will be. But it feels like home now. The silence no longer feels overwhelming. The routines are starting to stick. The bed gets made. The bills get paid.

And maybe that’s what progress actually looks like. Not having everything figured out. Not becoming some perfectly organized version of myself overnight. Just slowly growing into a life that once felt impossible.

For the first time in my life, I have a home that belongs entirely to me. It is colorful, slightly cluttered, occasionally powered by DoorDash, and still very much a work in progress.

But it’s mine.

And I think, after three years, I am finally starting to understand what that means.