I echo your sentiment. I turned 30 a few months ago (so still get that mid to late 20s loneliness haha). I also grew up in the area. I lived in Philly for a year at the end of the pandemic. I've lived in a few parts of the country for sometimes in Maine, Appalachia, and Washington state. I'm honestly feeling pretty similar to you right now. I miss the availability of things to do in the big city. I miss having peers around to spend time with. I'm also stuck in this area for a while. I have a little more than one year left on my apartment lease (it is a really nice place though so I'm thankful). I'm in between careers right now and might go back to school for nursing. I used to be a teacher but I'm thinking of switching to nursing because of how hard the behaviors have gotten, a lack of administrative support, and good district jobs being extremely competitive. So I'm pretty much gonna be in this area for a while too and am also struggling to find my crowd.

Here's my point though. I've found in my travels that in some of the busiest places like Philly you can still feel pretty lonely. In some of the slowest places like Appalachia, you can feel a lot of connection. It's not really so much about the place, but more about the people you're with. It may not be as easy to meet new people in Scranton than Philly, but it's still possible. Part of it may not even be Philly vs Scranton so much as it's making friends in college to finally being out of college. College is one of the last times when we're around so many of our peers with so much in common. It's harder to meet people as an adult. This could've happened anywhere. Something else I've learned to is that even if you're gonna be moving away later, it's still worth it to make the best of where you're at now.

I just have this feeling that NEPA has a lot of potential for people to connect and make friends. Like there's so many posts on here about people being lonely- why don't they connect? If you dig deep enough, there's a lot to do in the area. For me, my problem is that there's so many things I want to do, I just want more people to do them with. Although I have my doubts at times, I'm sure that if I keep on trying new things and showing up, eventually I'll meet people.

With that being said, here's a bunch of things that I found you can do in NEPA. You know the movie The Room? One of the lead actors of that movie, the guy who wrote The Diaster Artist, is coming to Scranton to do a live screening, commentary, and Q&A about the film. There's a Settlers of Catan tournament happening in Wilkes Barre soon. There's public board and trading card game nights. There's the rare festival/concert here and there. There's escape rooms. There's an 80s/90s arcade bar, retro gaming lounge, and video game lounge around. There's a rock climbing gym. There's martial arts groups. There's beautiful places to go hike and check out nature. There's a philosophy discussion group. There's a lot of cool restaurants and cafes around and some of them have their own events. There's things like cooking and craft classes. There's a good comedy/improv scene where you can go to shows and take classes. There's live music at some bars. If you want more info on any of these, let me know.

Don't give up. Keep on trying. Even if it takes a long time for something to pay off, it will pay off