The Introvert's Circle

I don’t make friends easily. I am an introvert through and through, much to the annoyance of my “golden-retriever-energy” husband. While he could spend hours chatting up every attendee at a party, I’d spend that time leaning against the wall, bouncing my knee with every second that dragged by. Social interaction will either energize you or drain you. I align myself with the latter.

Ever since middle school, living inside of my head has been natural for me. I was content with walking from class to class with my eyes on the ground. My mind would drift through a thousand alternate realities that I could have been living. Reading too many fantasy and fiction novels had fueled my overactive imagination, leaving me in a constant daydream. I didn’t mind; I was having adventures in my head.

Despite all of this, I occasionally found myself looking over and envying my peers. What was it like to have a crowd to fall into, protected on all sides by like-minded friends? On days I was feeling unusually brave, I would make attempts to insert myself into strangers’ inner circles with an awkward compliment or a forced joke. There would be polite laughs, followed by casual excuses to end the conversation. I would be left alone again, exactly where I was five minutes earlier. By the end of my senior year, I had become so accustomed to solitude that I had grown to crave it.

As I got older and entered my college years, my self-imposed isolation proved to be an asset. While my peers seemed to struggle with the newfound loneliness of young adulthood, I had years of practice under my belt. I buried myself in my studies, striving for academic validation over social connection. Every now and again, I would still feel a twinge of sadness when looking outside my window. I would see college students entering or exiting the Greek Row neighborhood, their arms wrapped around each others’ shoulders. Even though they were my same age, they all looked so much older and more experienced than I felt.

I attended a grand total of two house parties during my college years, both of which were hosted by my housemates. On each occasion, I was glued to the corner, terrified of starting a conversation with any of the dozens of strangers mingling around my living room. Each night ended around 10:30 PM when I slipped upstairs to my room and changed out of my “party clothes” (usually a knee-length dress with a cardigan overtop). I would crawl into bed, stone-cold sober, and fall asleep listening to muffled laughter. I told myself that things would be different after college. “You’re just focused on school right now,” I thought, “ Once you graduate, you’ll relax and be free to be as wild as you want.”

I went on to finish my studies in the third week of March 2020. You can probably guess what happened after that. I spent the next few years, like most people, holed up inside with my thoughts and dreams. At first, it wasn’t too bad; I had been training for lockdowns over the past decade by voluntarily staying away from people. Eventually, however, the forced isolation started to get to me. My husband patiently sat through countless rants about how I was wasting my early twenties and wanted to finally “go out.” I was living in a large city at the time and wanted to experience its nightlife. In hindsight, I had wanted to experience the nightlife sold to me through teen drama shows and aesthetic Instagram posts: hazy lounges, alleyways lit by neon signs, the sound of high-heels clicking on pavement with people turning their heads. “Who is she?” they would wonder, “She looks like someone ready to dance the night away.” Maybe the pandemic lockdown had made me slightly delusional, but I held onto that dream for three long years.

It wasn’t until a couple of months ago that I finally got my chance to “go out.” I had several social excursions in 2022, but those were limited to dinners with close friends and birthday parties with family members. It was in Hiroshima, Japan that I would finally get the opportunity to party all night long. I put on my designated “clubbing outfit”: leather skirt, low cut blouse, thigh-high boots. All black, of course. According to my research on Pinterest for “womens clubbing outfit 2023,” this was the perfect ensemble for the night.

From the moment we walked through the doors, I felt like I was going to implode. The atmosphere wasn't the problem, it was exactly what I was expecting; colorful strobe lights illuminated the artificial smoke as patrons wandered around with drinks in hand. The panic started to set in when I realized I was absurdly overdressed. Seeing girls pass by in baggy jeans and loose sweaters had me pulling my skirt as low as it could go. I felt like a Barbie doll that a toddler had dressed and drawn over with a Sharpie. Despite the air conditioned room, I was clammy on every part of my body.

The second problem was less obvious, but completely debilitating: I was terrified of people. The thought of anyone looking at me seemed to shrink my lungs to the size of golfballs, leaving me gasping shallow breaths. The reality was that no one in the club had glanced at me unkindly. In fact, I caught several men looking me up and down with a smile of curiosity. That didn’t stop my drumming heart and shaking legs keeping me glued to a wall. I lasted for 90 minutes before I convinced myself that the entry fee had been well spent and made a swift exit.

As my husband (who had been having the time of his life) and I walked back to our hotel, I reflected on how the club hadn’t met my expectations. While I had prepared myself for a lame venue or disorderly attendees to ruin my night, I hadn’t expected the downfall to come from my own discomfort. It didn’t matter how short my skirt was, how many layers of foundation I plastered on my face, or how tall my heels were: I was an introverted, nervous, awkward person who thrived in a soothing, protected environment. A costume wasn’t going to change my entire personality, even for one night.

How does one move on from a daydream they had spent years fantasizing about? Was I meant to spend my life cowering in a corner, watching the world passing by? I made a pact with myself: I would find the happy medium. In the weeks following, I started small: coffee dates with a friend from Japanese class, grabbing ramen with a colleague, and other small outings. Unlike the clubbing instance, I only had one pair of eyes on me to worry about. I fought the urges to disassociate from conversations and leave early. I made myself ask questions, listen intently, and divulge my own experiences. It took quite a bit of time, but I grew to look forward to seeing friends and catching up over a bite.

Fast-forward a couple of months later: my husband and I were sitting in a karaoke room, lit by a large TV monitor and a spinning disco ball. The small room was crowded with ten of our closest friends, most of whom I had grown closer with only recently. We were belting My Chemical Romance’s “Welcome to the Black Parade” when I realized: this was the feeling I was searching for. This was the belonging that I had wanted a decade ago as a lonely high schooler. I was acknowledged and appreciated by a group. All those meet-ups that extended my social battery life beyond its breaking point had been worth it.

I didn’t need a mini skirt and strobe lights. I had found my circle.