My high school was very clique-y. Not in the way that movies portray it, with every group neatly divided into easily labeled groups (the jocks, the nerds, the band kids, etc.), but in a way where everyone seemed to instinctively know which group they belonged to. With the way the school system was set up, everyone found their group during middle school. Sure, there were a few changes during high school (mainly as a result of COVID), but overall, most people were solid friends with the same kids they had known since sixth grade. I was a little different.

I was an athlete, but not one who played a popular sport. I was a band kid, but I refused to dedicate my life to marching band. I spent my weekends on hiking trails instead of on manicured sports fields. I didn’t even live in the same area of the county as the majority of my peers — they mostly lived in or around the major gated community, while I lived in the complete opposite corner of the county. The only group that I found consistent acceptance in was the theater kids, but since I didn’t participate in every single show, I was still on the outside of a lot of jokes.

I didn’t mind growing up this way. It was lonely at times, but I had friends I could eat lunch with and hang out with during P.E. However, by the end of senior year, I was ready to graduate and excited to find new friends at college.

When I first came to Allegheny, I was thrilled to meet new people. Because I had known most of my classmates since elementary school, they had all seen me go through my purple phase (when all my outfits included at least one purple item) and my Hermione Granger phase (where I was very much an annoying know-it-all). I was very eager to leave these phases behind. I was ready to make new friends and start a new chapter in my life. I was excited to live somewhere other than the house I was raised in and to experience weather that was cooler than Virginia’s, especially in the winter. But I was especially anticipatory because as a student athlete, I was joining a team — the Allegheny women’s golf team. I grew up playing golf on men’s teams because there weren’t enough women golfers in my local area to have women’s teams, so I was very excited to finally be on an all-women’s team. I was ready to have teammates who actually included me in the conversations held on-course (golf tournaments are very long, especially when the boys you are playing with are determined to ignore you for 18 holes) and to get tips and tricks from people who had a similar playing style and experience — not someone who could bully a course into submission through brute strength and distance. I was impatient to finally play with other women, not the boys that I had dealt with for the past decade.

It was not the sunshine and roses that I had anticipated, though. My mannerisms on the course were more masculine, my expectations different. I had always removed my hat to shake my opponents hands at the end of a round — something that I didn’t realize was only done by men until my first tournament. Although I now feel very connected to my teammates and proud to have a place on the team, in the beginning (meaning most of my freshman year), I struggled with the differences between myself and my teammates.

Off the course, it was a slightly different story. I became friends with the people in my orientation group since we had a once-weekly class together, and I really enjoyed our friendship. We bonded over terrible 1980s movies during craft afternoons every Friday after lunch and over finally being away from home and parents — typical freshman bonding. Once golf season started up again, however, the friendship grew strained. My friends from class, none of whom were athletes, did not seem to understand the time limits and expectations placed upon student athletes. I could no longer drop everything for an impromptu craft night because I had practice, lift or team dinner instead. My friends still invited me to their outings, but I almost always had to say no. Then, when we would have lunch together a few days later, they would reference inside jokes from the night that I had missed, intensifying my feeling of missing out. They didn’t mean to, and I completely understand that, but it was still hard, sometimes, when it felt like my attention was split between my various clubs and commitments. I finished my freshman year feeling unfulfilled — I had a variety of friend groups, but no specific group that did everything together, as movies and TV shows had promised I would.

Then, while I was on Instagram a few weeks ago, I stumbled upon a new term that I had never heard before: a floater friend. This term, which appears to have arisen around 18 months ago, refers to someone who is friends with a wide variety of people and part of a wide variety of groups without feeling especially connected to any specific one.

This was me, this was my experience! I instantly felt a connection. I constantly floated (now and in high school) between different groups, never in the core, but always orbiting.

The articles I read about being a floater friend vary. Some discuss how to become closer, how to prioritize one group of friends over another. Others explain how to stay connected with each group or how to keep the separate friendships without the loneliness of never having a core group of friends.

The articles about the latter were what I was more interested in. I don’t mind not having a core group of friends, but I enjoy being able to walk into Brooks or McKinley’s and see people I know, people I can eat with. Sometimes, being a floater friend is lonely, especially when I have to postpone plans with one group of friends for prior commitments or when I have to choose between two friend groups for dinner. Still, it’s likely that I will almost always find a friend in class or know someone at a big event. Also, I think that this is more similar to what I will encounter in real life — a variety of different friend groups for the different facets of my life, rather than one group that does absolutely everything together.

That isn’t to say that those friendships are bad. I will always be jealous of the people who have a few solid friends and have had them for years, but I’ve accepted my role as the floater friend — someone who is often on the outside, who never has a core group, but who finds friends in a variety of places across campus and always has someone to go to a game or show with. Although my path to understanding my role has been long (and occasionally lonely), I am now happy with my role and wouldn’t trade it for anything in the world.