A recently widowed man from Alton, East Hampshire has put up a poster asking for friends after his wife died from pancreatic cancer, leaving him isolated since May.
Tony Williams, 75, and his wife were unable to have any children, and often goes for days without speaking to anyone.
Feeling “cursed” by loneliness, the retired physicist finds himself sitting by the phone, hoping it will ring but never does.
“I have lost Jo, my lovely wife and soul mate. I have no friends and nobody to talk to. I find the unremitting silence 24-hours-a-day unbearable torture. Can nobody help me?” his sign reads.
Without any family nearby, Williams had already put two adverts in his local newspaper looking for a friend to chat, to no avail.
He had also made business cards to hand out at supermarkets or out for a walk, hoping to find a friend who would listen to music with him or sit alongside him in the garden.
“It’s my last resort. I’ve tried everything to make friends, but it feels like nobody wants to talk to me,” Williams explained.
“Not very many people pass my house, but I was hoping it would spread around the community, and someone might reach out.”
“Jo was my best friend and we had a lovely life. But now I’m all by myself. My wonderful wife has just died, and I have nobody,” he added.
“All I want is for somebody to see the sign and phone me up. I just want a nice conversation so I’m not sat in silence all day long.”
He urged that he’s not “looking for someone to listen to my cry,” but a person to chat with about anything.
Williams is not close to his late wife’s family, and his own three siblings live far away.
While his neighbors offered to help, he said he is looking for someone his own age.