"Not necessarily a space with swings and goals, but places where you don't have to produce, compete, buy or demonstrate anything. A bench in the square. A library. A neighborhood association."
Writer, winner of the Todo Mejora 2026 Prize for youth literature LGTBIQ+ , It Gets Better Spain.
As we grow older, many of the spaces where we could meet without having to justify why we were there disappear . Perhaps part of adult loneliness begins precisely here: when we stop having places where we feel like we are part of something.
During childhood, almost everything is designed for us to interact. We have the schoolyard, the park, extracurricular activities, camps, sports teams. Spaces where we meet other people without having to arrange an appointment weeks in advance or explain what we hope to get out of that meeting. Then we grow up.
Work, obligations, children, care, bills, travel and impossible schedules arrive. Life is filled with responsibilities while shared spaces become smaller and smaller. Until one day we discover that we can spend many hours surrounded by people and, despite everything, not feel accompanied .
Because coinciding is not always finding each other .
We can share an office without knowing each other. Living in the same building without knowing whose name we have on the landing. Exchanging messages every day and not having anyone to call when something breaks inside us.
We have turned many adult relationships into a matter of agenda . Before seeing someone, we have to find a day, agree on a time, and decide what we are going to do. Even affection seems to need a specific purpose. Meeting for dinner. Going to the movies. Celebrating something. Solving a problem.
It's hard for us, on the other hand, to find ourselves just to be there .
Maybe that's why we adults also need a playground.
Not necessarily a space with swings and goals, but places where there is no need to produce , compete, buy or demonstrate anything. A bench in the square. A library. A neighborhood association. A community center. A community garden. A choir. A theater group. A hiking group. A book club. A cultural, social or sports entity where someone notices that we haven't been there for days.
Spaces where our absence has weight.
We often talk about loneliness as if it were a strictly individual problem. As if the person who feels lonely should go out more, meet people or make an effort to socialize. But perhaps we should also ask ourselves what collective spaces we are building so that finding oneself is truly possible.
Not everyone has a family available. Not everyone retains the friendships of their youth. Not everyone can pay for activities, consume leisure or travel to maintain ties. And not everyone knows how to enter alone into a place where it seems that others already know each other. Creating community is not just about opening a door . It also involves looking at who has not yet dared to cross it.
This is where organizations, neighborhood movements, public facilities, and community projects have a function that goes far beyond the activity they advertise. A choir is not just a place to sing. A theater group is not just for performing a play. An association is not just a legal structure or a sum of meetings, events, and subsidies.
They are spaces of belonging . Places where we can recover something that adulthood has taken from us: the possibility of relating without having to turn every encounter into a result.
Sometimes, being part of a community starts with very small gestures . Someone who holds a chair for us. A person who asks us how we are and really waits for the answer. A group that writes to us when we haven't been there. A weekly activity that puts a firm point in the middle of days that are too similar.
We don't always need a deep conversation. Sometimes it's enough to know that on Wednesday, at seven, someone will be waiting for us.
We have been taught that becoming an adult means learning to stand on our own. But absolute independence is a fiction . Everyone needs to be recognized, heard, and taken into account. Everyone needs somewhere where they are not invisible.
We may not be able to avoid all silences or all loneliness. But we can build spaces where it costs a little less to disappear .
Children have the playground so they understand that growing up also means living together . Adults, on the other hand, often try to continue growing without a place to meet.
And maybe a community begins exactly like this: when someone leaves a free chair and tells us that we still fit in.
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