Grew up in a medium sized mostly working-class town in Northern England. My whole childhood I felt like an outsider, nobody cared about the things I cared about, whenever I spoke it was met with complete silence or indifference. I thought there was something wrong with me at a fundamental level, perhaps autism. First day at uni (19 yo) I stayed in my room most of the night, terrified. Finally summoned up the courage and socialised. Week later I stepped out of my room into the communal kitchen. A conversation was going on and someone asked my opinion. It suddenly occurred to me that that had never happened to me before entire life. I wasn’t some weirdo everyone was scared of or didn’t understand. Normal person, normal interests; just different to the tiny society I gre up in. Now married 35 living in Boston at junior faculty at Harvard Medical School, that tiny moment in the dorm kitchen shaped my whole life for the better, and university is the reason.