One of these things is not like the others

People travel in packs with other people that are just like them. That's at least what I was told when I was a young girl. I never believed that it was completly true since my friends were always what I wanted to be but never what I saw myself as.
In high school I was friends with the really smart people in school. My grades would tell you other wise about my intelligence. Yes I did go to a Magnet school, yes I understood the criteria in class but I was unwilling to do all the work. I doubted my intelligence still do actually.
In high school I also hung out with the group of people that would be considered artsy. All the girls had long hair that they would put up in ponytails. They'd wear long flowing skirts with flower prints with birkenstocks or their old Converse. They'd have charcoal or paint on their faces after school. The boys were all smokers and in some kind of band. There was the Dave triad in my grade too. Dave M. wore Doc Martens and black jeans w/ a white shirt and his leather jacket year round. Dave Green wore dresses to school year round but was straight. His hear would be a variety of colors but mostly green. Dave Garcia was the pretty boy of all three but still hung out with the group and played the guitar for the girls. I didn't have an artistic bone in me. I sometimes wondered if they just let me in their group to be nice.
In college no matter where I sat down in classes people seemed to flock near me because I was the smart girl according to them. I was quiet but I didn't get half of what was going on in class. It seemed my classmates got less then I did though. When I walked into the music lounge in school there was always someone in one of the popular cliques that wanted me to sit with them. They wanted me to explain something or just wanted to talk. I would hide in the cafeteria to eat and study. Every semester someone in one of my science classes would find me and ask me to explain something. Before I knew it each semester I had a study group I never planned on of ten people. I over heard someone once say oh she's the popular girl in John's group. John was the popular guy in the class. John and I helped each other with homework but I never thought I was part of his group or that they all liked me. Yes they were nice to me but they had to be they knew I was the one who would explain the mysterious of biology to them.
When I started taking the pre-requisites for Nursing I sat in the seat that made it easiest to leave the class. Medical terminolgy seemed like it was going to be boring. I was surprised when the girl w/ dyed black hair and tattoos sat next to me and started chatting me up. I was more shocked when a week later we were on campus and she said hi to me and introduced me to as the cool chic in her med. term class. I wasn't tattoed I ddin't have smart ass comments to make all I did was be nice to her. I made friends w/ all the goth kids that semester. I wasnt' goth though so I didn't get it.
Then it happened I graduated college and became an adult. I moved out on my own into Univ. City. I found myself hanging out with all the pretty girls in my neighborhood. They all liked to wear nothing but name brands and just out shine everyone. I was stunned by their beauty but they loved to include me in things. I like pretty clothes, I like name brands but I'm not pretty so why befriend me? Then I met my neighbors... the hippie, the artist, the seamestress and her boyfriend, the pretty blonde with brains. We can all talk in the hallway togehter for hours. My apartment is the center of activity in the building. We do things together and I'm always having my door knocked with one of them having a question. The artsy building with me the social worker... and yet the befriend me. I'm not like them or so I think so, so why do I befriend them if I travel with them why don't I look like them or am like them? Am I missing something?