Making Friends in Low Places (Texas, mainly)

Let me start off by saying that I by no means want my next statements to come off as snotty. I don’t believe I’m entitled to anything, let alone friends. However, I have never had any problems making friends or being “popular.” Again, using the word popular isn’t probably the most effective word, but let’s just say that I’ve always had really beautiful, talented and nice friends. Therefore, I believe that they must be popular. I’m not beautiful, but I feel like I attract beautiful people, soooo somehow that means I’m okay at friend making. And now I’m going to stop digging myself a hole….

That being said, I thought friend-making would come a lot easier for me in Dallas. Somehow I thought I would magically appear down here and have tons of friends to go out with, but that is not the case at all. Making friends in the real-world is super hard. Making friends in college is easy because we’re basically forced into friendships. Seeing the same people every day in the hallways or in the bathrooms forces friendships. However, when you’re dropped in the middle of nowhere by yourself, making friends is especially hard. I feel like I’m slowly making friends with several of my coworkers, but I don’t want to hang out with them every weekend because I’m scared they’ll get sick of me. I think I could make friends in my gym, but I’m not quite sure how to approach that situation.

I was wearing a “Nebraska Engineering” shirt the other day at the gym and a really good-looking guy came up and asked me if I was into engineering. I looked at him like he was crazy and said…”uhhh…no…” Then he’s like, “Well, why do you have an engineering shirt on?” Then it hit me. DUHHH. So we had a nice little conversation about Nebraska’s engineering program. Which, by the way, I know nothing about, but pretended to for conversation’s sake. He had a liberal arts degree, so I doubt he knew I was a big, fat liar. He had to get back to work, but introduced himself to me at the end of our conversation. Lee was his name. I said I was Jessica. And then there was an awkward, “Well, see you around.” So are we gym friends? Can I be friends with this Lee guy? How do I approach this situation? Should I declare we’re friends? Perhaps I should have said something like, “Lee, it was great to meet you. I’m friendless, so would you like to be friends with me?”

Some of my friends back home have been trying to tell me to go out and make friends. That’s so much easier said that done. What am I supposed to do? Go to a bar and sit around asking people if they’d like to be friends with me? Look really desperate for a friend and someone will approach me?

Seriously though, any advice would be appreciated. I’m not lonely yet, but I may be on the brink.