Life in the big city is always exciting and new. However, for most of the people leading that exciting life, they are miles and sometimes worlds away from their family and closest friends. This is the phenomenon known as "the transplant." Most people associate transplants with hearts and kidneys, but for those of us without old roots in the city, it aptly describes how different life can be once we are excised from home and implanted into the new city. The first thing many of us notice is the traffic. Who are all these people and where are they going! The frustration of navigating unfamiliar roadways while constantly hitting the breaks after the hundreth eight-inch crawl can quickly make one regret movin' on up. After you get over the traffic, there's the matter of getting a job. Competition is fierce and the pool of talent is incredible. You send out hundreds of resumes and go on numerous interviews, only to be told "sorry, but we're looking for something different." The feeling of desperation kicks in as the bills pile up. Then you lower your standards and become willing to take anything that bites. One option for many is a temp agency. They always want people with nice resumes and they do the dirty work of getting the employer to say yes.

Now that you're working and kicking yourself for having that manual transmission in traffic that never moves above first gear, you work on getting yourself set up in your new city, oftentimes without a safety net. It becomes apparent that rent is high and whole areas are cut off to you since you don't like the idea of being mugged every night. You end up in a mediocre apartment, close enough to get to work, but too far away to easily take the metro or drive. You have to put up with your roommate's wild night life and apparent lack of a job and ability to pay bills so that you further stress about whether you'll be evicted next month. Your new digs will be sparsely furnished since the vast majority of your paycheck is just covering the rent and those huge student loans you took out so you'd have a degree and wouldn't have to live like the working poor. You soon realize that these confluence of events put a major damper on your social life. You spend so much time at work to afford what little you have, that you have no time or energy for socializing or dating.

So you turn to the internet, the haven of the transplant. You find yourself drawn to others in your situation, which doesn't help matters much. Neither of you can afford dinner and a movie, so you try to interest them with your cooking skills at home. Unfortunately, your roommate is drunk once again and finds your prospective beau to be very hot indeed. You try to press on, and make whatever 5 dollars worth of food makes possible. After the night is over, you wonder how things will turn out. But this is the life of the transplant, always up in the air, searching for ground you can put roots into. It's not a life without its twists and turns and it is definitely never dull!