My mom asked me last week why I don't have a "group."

Not in a mean way. Just curious. She'd seen my sister's Instagram — ten people at brunch, someone's birthday, matching outfits at a concert. She looked at me and said, "You used to have so many friends. What happened?"

I didn't have an answer ready. I just shrugged and said something about being busy.

But the question stayed with me.

Because she's right. I did have many friends once.

I was the kid whose house was always loud. My mother used to complain about it — how there was always someone at the door, always someone asking if I could come out, always noise. I stammered when I spoke, turned red when adults talked to me, but somehow I was never alone. There were birthday parties with twenty kids. Group projects that actually felt like groups. A best friend every year.

I looked social. I looked like I belonged.

But I've been thinking about those friendships lately, and I'm not sure how deep they actually went.

We were friends because we lived on the same street. Because our parents knew each other. Because we were in the same class and had the same recess time. Proximity made us close. Routine made us comfortable.

I don't know if any of them would have shown up if things got hard. I don't know if I would have, either.

I'm not saying that to be bitter. It's just honest. Childhood friendships are often about who's available, not who actually sees you.

Somewhere in my twenties, I started paying attention.

Not in a paranoid way. Just… noticing. How some people only called when they needed something. How others disappeared when I couldn't show up the way they wanted. How a few stuck around even when I had nothing to offer but honesty and silence.

I stopped saying yes to everything. I stopped performing availability. I started asking myself if I actually wanted to be there, or if I just felt like I should be.

It wasn't a dramatic shift. No falling out, no big confrontation. I just became quieter. More deliberate. I let some things fade.

And I didn't replace them.

I work in software, and there's this principle I think about sometimes: you can have a thousand lines of fragile code that barely works, or you can have fifty lines of clean, production-ready code that does exactly what it needs to do.

Friendship feels the same to me now.

I don't need a lot of people. I need the right people. The ones I can call at 2 a.m., not because I'm in crisis, but because I thought of something and knew they'd get it. The ones who don't take silence personally. The ones who've seen me at my worst and didn't flinch.

That's maybe three people. Maybe four.

And I'm fine with that.

But somewhere along the way, we decided that a full social calendar equals a full life. That if you're not always out, always posting, always surrounded, you must be lonely. Or broken. Or doing something wrong.

When did solitude become something we have to justify?

I like my own company. I like long walks with no destination. I like entire Saturdays where I don't speak to anyone and don't feel guilty about it. I like having dinner with one person and talking for three hours instead of having dinner with ten people and talking about nothing.

I'm not unsociable. I'm selectively social.

And I think that's taken me this long to say out loud because for a while, I wondered if something was wrong with me. If I were missing some gene that made other people crave constant connection. If I were cold, or damaged, or just bad at being human.

But I don't think that anymore.

I think I just learned the difference between filling a room and filling a life.

My aunt might not understand. My cousin might still post her group brunches and feel more alive than I do on my quiet Saturday mornings. And that's fine. We're allowed to need different things.

But if someone asks me again why I don't have a "group," I think I'll tell them the truth:

I'm not looking for more people.

I'm looking for the right people.

And I'm not in a hurry.

So here's my question for you: Do you have a "group," or do you have your people? And how did you figure out the difference?