So, I went to lunch with some of my friends today…the roomies, Kelly and Sungti (Jen already had plans with work people) at The Happy Sumo for sushi. I love that I have friends up here who like sushi. As we were sitting at lunch I was thinking about how much I enjoy these particular friends. I thought (and then proceeded to say out loud, which seems to be my totally embarrassing habit), “You are the cool friends that I always wanted.” You can imagine the laughter that ensued…but it’s true.

Sarah (who always looks fabulous…she’s inspired me to wear heels with jeans), Richard (our favorite entertainer) and Kelly (who just moved here from Chicago–need I say more?) are all designers at American Crafts , this great scrapbook company. Sungti is heading to school for his PhD in the fall and he’s from Taiwan—that alone makes him cool. And Jennifer (not at lunch, but she’s the thread that strung us all together…and she’s married to Sungti) has her master’s and is just this amazing person I have envied since our freshman year in college.

I wonder if most people feel the way I do at times, or if there are people out there who just think, “Yes, everyone should want to be me or at least be friends with me.” I look at my friends and think, “They have to know how fabulous they are.” Maybe it’s just in the way we, as humans, compare our weaknesses with others’ strengths. Maybe it’s the way we always admire the qualities we lack or wish we had, because we are so used to our own qualities that we find them boring and ordinary. I have had so many amazing opportunities in my life and done so many amazing things, and yet I still find myself envying (in a good way) those who are different than me. And I wonder if there are those out there who look at me and think, “I wish my life was more like hers.” My assumption, of course, is that there are not, but the more I thought about it today, the more I questioned.