Feeling Like I Fit In

The feeling of fitting in has always been strange, bordering on foreign, to me. I think that's because it happens so rarely. In school growing up, I was always too much of something or not enough of something else to really fit in with any one group. As such, I just did my own thing athletically, academically, etc. It was lonely sometimes, but I got the job done and the results have been good for the most part. Today at work, I was part of a business lunch with a law firm who sometimes does work for our company. Although we have a Legal Department and I am part of it, sometimes there are cases that are better worked by outside counsel. When that happens in Tennessee, this firm is mostly who we use. The lunch was their way of saying thank you to our company for our business.

As I sat there today amongst a half a dozen other lawyers eating a very nice meal, it dawned on me that I actually do fit in here. To quote Stuart Smalley from Saturday Night Live, "I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and dog-gone it people like me!" Being treated like a peer, as an equal...man, that's heady stuff. I don't plan to let it go to my head, and that feeling alone isn't enough to make me sure I want to be a lawyer forever, but it really was a nice feeling. It's things like that, rewards which are small yet fulfilling, that make for great return on investment emotionally and psychologically for all the dog days of education and working jobs I hated. It really was good times, and I am glad God allowed me to experience it.