#then proceed

like, I don't know how to explain how it made me feel.

I've never really had a really strong core group of friends all in one place at one time, like the way my brother and sister both did during their high school careers. I have a few close friends, but they're not centralized--they're not a group of people I can sit with at lunch everyday. they're at other schools or across the country, and most of the time I feel like I'm alone in almost everything I do.

but during like...sophomore year, I started sitting with this group of guys in the math/science department at my school, and no questions asked, they absorbed me into the group. they all like hang out together outside of school and play tennis and video games and go out to dinner and have general shenanigans that I'm not a part of, but that's alright; they've all known each other since like eighth grade. but every day at lunch, there's always a seat for me at the table, and if there's not, at least one of them offers theirs up to me. there are two other girls, and they're each dating a guy in the group, but I'm the only single non-math/science female in the group and it's just no big deal. I'm not physically attractive, and I'm only medium-level intelligence compared to them, but they don't really seem to care. none of these things matter. we crack horribly inappropriate jokes and talk shit and get philosophical and political and philanthropic in discussing community service projects and shit like that. it's like it's no big deal that I'm not really "one of them."

and it's just nice. I don't feel too stressed out about the way that I am or the way I'm perceived; part of that is due to me being a senior this year and not feeling like I have to live up to anyone else's standards, my own standards notwithstanding. even though I'm not super super close to any of them or tell any of them, like...my personal shit, and I hardly know any of theirs, it's just nice to always have a place to go. like a sunken spot in a well-loved piece of furniture, I always feel like I can sit and belong. 

this kind of got away from me, but the point here is that one of the more enthusiastic people that sits at the table (Karan) referred to the table as "our lunch table," like...intimately inclusive, almost. not that the two of us reign over it or anything, but that it's something that I'm a part of, and it was publicly acknowledged further than them just saving me a spot at the table.