Left Out

Being left out sucks. Nobody likes it.

It used to happen to me all the time in high school. My “friends” had this habit of doing things without inviting me – and then laughing about inside jokes that came out of those gatherings in front of me.

Since I know how crappy it feels, I’ve always made an effort to not make people feel left out. I don’t bring up activities that a present party isn’t invited to, and I even try to explain the gist of inside jokes if the number of people who don’t get it is anywhere close to the number of people who do.

Honestly, my hatred of feeling left out might be to blame for my feelings about Valentine’s Day. Feb. 14 is the ultimate left out day because more often than not, the ones who care about it most are the ones who feel like they don’t have anyone to celebrate it with. How crappy is that?  

You know what else is crappy? I’ve recently found myself in that same effing situation my high school “friends” put me in.

K and I have people over to the house all the time. For game nights, for potluck dinners, for watch parties … We typically wind up with 10 people, sometimes closer to 20. But we always invite everyone from our kickball team.

Many of the girls on our team watch The Bachelor. I do not. However, I went to a watch party for the show last year just to get some good girl time. I love me some girl time. So much that I’ll even put up with a craptastic show like The Bachelor just to get it.

Last year, it was a small group of three who watched the show each week. This year, it’s a big group. I’m not quite sure how big, though, because I wasn’t invited. I do know there’s a final pick pool involved (which is totally the way to make me semi-enjoy the show!), and every girl I know goes. It’s come up in conversation the last few times I’ve been in a group setting with more than one girl in The Bachelor Group. Which sucks.

It really hurts my feelings.

It came up yesterday when K and I went to watch some of our kickball friends play in another league. The semi-boyfriend of one of The Bachelor girls said, “Oh, so this is the group who watches The Bachelor.” The girl, who is one of my closest friends here and I regularly have lunch dates with, said, “Oh, no, MLIB hates The Bachelor.”

That may be true, but I’d love the opportunity to make the decision myself. Had I had that chance, I’d probably have joined. Weekly girl time and a glass of wine? Who would turn that down?

I was really upset about the whole thing yesterday, and I had mentioned it to K a few times. He told me I should talk to the organizer (I’m not even sure which girl that is) and find out why I wasn’t invited.

Only I’m not sure that’s fair. I mean, it’s their right to do whatever they want, and they can invite whoever they want. It would be nice if they didn’t talk about it so openly so I’d find out about it (again and again), but I guess that’s just life.

My feelings are justified, but that doesn’t mean they owe me an explanation or even an apology for not inviting me.

K felt differently. He told me if I wasn’t going to ask the girls about it, he didn’t want to hear about it anymore. When I told him I felt like that was unfair, he opened up. He agrees that it’s crap, and he actually thinks they owe it to me to invite me. As many parties and gatherings as we’ve had; as much beer, snacks, and alcohol as they’ve had at our house … He says we’ve invested in these friendships, and it’s not right for them to not invite me.

I see what he’s saying, but I disagree that they owe us anything. We choose to invite them to our house. We choose to share food and drinks (everyone brings a little something, but we have our kegerator). But we can’t do that with any expectations.

So I’m stuck. I hate drama, and I definitely don’t want to start anything unnecessarily. But at the same time, I think it’s rude for them to talk about this group when others who aren’t a part of it are around.

I swear, this is why I quit hanging out with girls in college!