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# A Table for One
- URL: https://chosen.authorkclynch.com/a-table-for-one/
- Published: 2023-08-16T03:24:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-07-21T18:30:51.000Z
- Description: Being alone and being lonely are not the same thing. I'm still learning the difference.
- Author: S.
- Tags: Chosen, Not Kept

*Tonight I took myself to dinner.*

*Not takeout. Not delivery eaten over a case brief. A restaurant. A table for one.*

*The hostess gave me the look. You know the one. Pity wearing a customer-service smile.*

*I almost left.*

*Then I remembered I have survived worse things than being seen alone.*

*So I stayed.*

*I ordered the expensive glass of wine. I ate dessert before I finished dinner. I read forty pages of a book nobody assigned me.*

*And somewhere between the second bite of chocolate cake and the woman at the next table asking what I was reading, I realized something.*

***Being alone and being lonely are not the same thing.***

*I'm still learning the difference.*

*— S.*