Invite Only

            Ever been in a situation where you know without a doubt that you are on the outside of some interesting and exciting event?  Where you can clearly define a boundary between you and the group partaking in a secret act?  Well, today I was the unfortunate outsider in this scenario.

            I was enjoying a nice lunch by myself at the end of a table, completely unaware of who else was sitting around me.  My silent meal was then punctured by the loud cawing and cackling of three girls only a few places down from my seat.  Now previously, I (and most likely everyone else having lunch at that moment) had not given them a second thought or care.  And they probably would have gone unnoticed if not for their obnoxious, uncontrolled outburst.  Let me clarify for a moment to impress upon you just how loud this laugh was.  There was nothing subtle about it, such as a giggle that gradually manifests itself into a hearty laugh.  In fact, if there ever was a perfect antonym to subtle, these girls nailed it.

            But let us turn to the matter at hand:  the girls laugh, and invariably, every person pauses as all heads turn to look at this select faction.  For that brief second, everyone shares in the same act.  All, including the three girls, are interested in what had caused this extravagant laughter.  Yet, even though the girls are sharing their laughter with the public, they are at the same time excluding others from participating in it.  In this way, the girls use laughter to act as a social restriction.  Those of us who do not laugh clearly demonstrate the divide between ourselves and the three girls.  Only those who are lucky or special enough to be allowed in their circle would have access to the joy they are now experiencing.  Through laughter, they portray their happiness of being a member of the focal group.  For this reason laughter acts as a means of thankfulness:  the girls are laughing at their fortune of being one of the “elite” so to speak and not a member of the “ordinary lunchers” who are missing out on such a funny story or joke.

          As I said before, without the noise, they would not have made an impact on anyone’s lunchtime.  Instead, as I made a slight breach of social etiquette and eavesdropped on the table behind me, I heard a couple wondering what could have been so funny.  I smiled, as I myself had been thinking that very same thing, and wondered how many similar conversations were occurring at other tables.  The girls most likely did not realize it, but they had created a social tier within the lunch room consisting of those who laughed with them and those who wished they had.