Hi, Clara! I found your blog a few weeks ago and I love how real and down to earth it is. I’d love some advice!
I live in a small town in the South (population about 1,500) and I’m about to go to college in Chicago. I was always kind of an introvert and not a huge risk taker in high school, but I’m hoping college will help me expand my horizons.
First, could you tell me how to deal with a more urban setting? I literally never lock my front doors here, and me and my friends’ idea of a good time is fishing, having a bonfire or playing cards in someone’s basement.
Also, how do I make friends in such a huge place?! I’m not a total shut in, but if I’m being honest, I doubt I’ve met many new people or made many new friends in the past 15 years. I’ve kind of just seen the same 1,500 people that live where I do.
Thanks! Any help would be awesome
Aww you guys are the best. These reader emails keep getting more fun. I freaking love it. Hi!
First of all, don’t be worried (I feel like I start every advice post this way. But nobody has written with any truly worrisome situations yet. If somebody were like “I am being stalked by a murderer and my parents are zombies and my dog has ebola” I would probably tell them to be worried). A lot of people feel this way!
I promise though, you’ll find a way to branch out if you want to. High school is a kind of terrible time to take risks socially anyway — especially at a small high school where everyone’s known each other since second grade. In college, everyone’s a stranger, which is actually really nice.
First of all, no one knows what to expect of you. If you dye your hair and change your name (and delete your facebook), you can literally become a different person in college and no one will have any idea you didn’t always go by “Rainbow”. People just take each other at face value for the first semester or so. If you’re trying to go for some kind of personal renaissance, now’s the time. (Eventually all this face-value business will get irritating, but at the beginning people just want to sort through the hundreds of potential friends as efficiently as possible.)
That’s the other reason it’s nice that everyone’s a stranger: Everyone is desperate for friends. Most people haven’t made new friends from scratch since kindergarten (you’re not the only one!). And it’s stressful, but this works to your advantage.
I had to make a new batch of friends twice in two years, because my family moved to Switzerland when I was a senior in high school. Moving to a new high school as a senior is a totally insane thing to do, by the way. People are pretty set in their ways by that point, so it took some painfully awkward maneuvering to carve myself a spot in the weird international school social scene.
Anyway, I made all these new Swiss friends, hung out for a year, and then left to go to college and do it all over again. Believe me when I say making friends was much easier the second time, and not just because I had experience. College freshmen are just hyper-outgoing, and therefore easy to connect with. Even if you think you’re shy, you’ll find yourself chatting with absolute strangers out of loneliness and desperation. And they’ll be lonely and desperate too, and they will chat right back. It’s so much more fun than I’m making it sound. Just trust me.
Eventually the social scene will start to develop around you. The first couple weeks are friend-anarchy, but after that you’ll begin to figure out what groups are tentatively forming. If you want to go out and party in Chicago every night, I’m certain you will find people who want to join you. If you’re feeling nostalgic and just want to play cards, I am even more certain you will find people to play cards with you. I have learned a shocking number of new games since coming to college.
As for life in the big city, lock your damn doors. People do steal stuff on college campuses. It sucks, but it happens. And while we’re on about safety, try not to walk alone at night. There’s usually a way to get somebody to escort you to wherever you’re going. At Brown, you can literally call public safety to pick you up and drive you home if the nighttime shuttle isn’t running anymore. It’s awesome. And if that doesn’t work, you can always imply that whoever walks you home will be thanked in sexual favors. Whether you want to follow through on that is up to you.
But cities are about more than stranger danger. Go to some fucking museums or something. I hear Chicago has a lake that people are pretty into. Go look at it! Carpe diem!!
I hope that answered your questions. I swear, pretty much everybody does make friends. Introverted readers, come out and attest to this! Have any of you made the big city transition? I’ve never been a small town girl (living in a lonely world). What’s that like?
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