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Why I stopped apologizing for reading alone at the diner counter
Every Thursday at the 24-hour place off I-35, I sit with a paperback and order one coffee, and people keep sliding over asking if I'm waiting for someone. I'm not being rude or lonely, I'm just having breakfast with myself, and honestly the empty stool next to me is the social contract I'm fine breaking. Has anyone else found that solo dining in a group-oriented spot gets you more stares than it should?
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tylerblack6d ago
There's a weird rule in our heads that being alone in public means something is wrong with you. Like the only reason to sit at a counter by yourself is that your plans fell through. But you see the same thing at movies and parks and even walking down the street. Somebody on their own gets treated like a problem to solve. I've noticed it goes the other way too, where people in groups act like a single person is somehow taking up space that belongs to them. It's all in our heads. A stool is a stool and coffee does not care who drinks it.
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