This has been something on my mind a lot.

There’s only been one time at my life where I was able to make friends — like, actual, proper, YA novel, Friends level friends, and that was during the senior year of high school. Almost 10 years ago now. And of those friendships, the ones that aren’t dead are definitely . . . on life support, I guess? We’re friends on social media, but it means almost nothing.

Except that they’re there. And there’s a part of me that keeps thinking about reaching out to them.

Because, by my age, it seems like people already have their circles of friends. They have their inside jokes, they have their habits, they have their things. And any time I think about reaching out and making friends — say, hanging out with people at my school’s theatre department — I get overwhelmed with the sense that “oh, yes, these people are friends. And they’re being perfectly nice to me, but they’re not my friend. They already have their friends. Their whole circle is already filled out; they don’t need me.”

So then, in the pursuit of trying to make new friends, I’m the asshole who’s trying to wedge myself into a space that’s already full enough and happy without me.

Or, in my case. I’m the guy who doesn’t. And then goes back to stalking his once-upon-a-friends on social media.

Okay, I’ve rambled on way too much. But this definitely struck a chord.