Living situation and socialization

Jainaday · Posted: Sat Jul 21, 2007 10:32 pm Post subject:

As a college student, I'm finding I have a terrible time sorting out- and getting- appropriate living situations. Where I live now is close to school, but expensive, loud, and so full of people that I often find myself wanting to curl up in a ball and stim, even though I have a private room and don't really see my house mates that much. This wastes a lot of time that I should be spending studying. I also tend to get depressed when I don't get enough actual social interaction- by which I mean, meaningful conversation with others I share something in common with. I've been house hunting for a couple of days for somewhere to go when my lease is up- in about three and a half weeks- but am not quite sure how to evaluate my options.

I found one place that's a good half hour away from here which, except for the distance, seems almost perfect; it's a lovely house, the people already living there seem both mature and fun, and it's both far away from hustle and bustle and close to the mountains, which I love. It's also about a third less than market rent, largely due to the isolation.

I'm just worried that I'm over-reacting to my current social over-stimulation and that I'll end up being too isolated. The other problem with it is that it doesn't have internet- and because of it's location, high speed is almost out of the question. Of course there are other concerns about the excessive driving, for reasons both of stress and of ecological damage, but I'm hoping I can work around those- by carpooling, for a start.

I've thought about some other things I could do to mitigate the negatives- so far I have this list:
a) requesting that my friends visit me on some sort of schedule- such as requesting that each of them pick a month and visit me sometime in that month- so that I don't completely loose touch, and always have something to look forward to
b) getting dial up so that I can interact with people online
c) rearranging my schedule if possible so that my school day isn't quite so long (almost ten hours including transport) and so that, therefore, it won't be so stressful to be far away from home.

Does anyone have any other ideas on how I could deal with the drawbacks of living out in the middle of nowhere? Or, does anyone have any advice on how to deal with the noise, people, and isolation from nature that inevitably seem to come with traditional student housing?

I wish I could find something in between, but it doesn't seem particularly likely, and I'm a little tired of looking. . .