I moved into this student building on Monday. I share the house with 4 other people, all of them international students. It's a big house, all the bedrooms are big, kitchen is huge, but the whole place is very run down, it's actually classified as a monument. Yeah, go figure.

Well anyway, I don't have a lot of experience living outside my family house, I basically lived there for 24 years with one exception of 4 months. When I moved in here, I was a little uneasy about how well I would get along with the others and thinking maybe I would feel awkward and uncomfortable. Well, I haven't really had that. But there are times when I am alone for a long time, like half a day. I may be out shopping or walking around, it doesn't matter, the point is I'm not talking to anyone. In moments like that, I feel a bit bored and locked in in my room. I find that I don't know what I really would like to do in times like that, but it's certainly not whatever I'm currently doing it, I need some change of perspective.

What I realized today is that for moments like that, talking to people is wonderful therapy. It's not because something or other is being discussed, it doesn't matter what the conversation is about, so long as it keeps you engaged and you don't tune out to study the curtains because it's so boring. (Obviously, at this point it requires you to participate actively enough so that the conversation doesn't derail in such a way.) Then, after I chat for a while, half an hour, an hour, the longer the better in fact, and the more people involved the better also, I go back to my room and I feel better suddenly. Like I got what I needed somehow, even though I never knew what that was. I used to have this living at home as well from time to time, but back home you know the people so well that they become a bit neutral in how they affect you, you simply know them inside out. If you move in with people you don't know, it's a lot more dynamic.