My apologies for this novel I've written you but I'm not really understanding the point of your post other than to rag on Dallas and I'm sorry you feel that way. My boyfriend and I lived in Dallas for 9 years. We moved here to Austin about a year and half ago when the only jobs for video game making turned out to be in Austin but we, honestly, were ready to live in Dallas forever. Your story sounds like mine - I'm even almost your age and I'm an SLP so I feel you about the medical and rehab field not even being safe here. All my Southern belle, prissy grad school friends thought my liberal and "weird ways" would be a perfect fit for Austin. (You frequent the Angelika and like good coffee? Get outta here, you hippie!) I moved here and HATED IT until recently. The cost of living, the ridiculous traffic, the way that everyone here tries so hard to be different that they all end being the same - a nightmare. I'm only just now finding my niche. It turns out not everyone here sold all their possessions to form an all ukelele bluegrass/dub step collective! There are sane people who like the things I like and it's still shaky ground in making close friends. You sound like you've got a pretty formed opinion of the city you live in. You have to let that go- it sounds like that's what's holding you back from appreciating the city you live in and to be honest, you're in such an awesome part of Dallas!!! Appreciate that you don't have to fight hordes of hipsters to go on brewery tours, that you have more than one grocery store within 5 miles of you and it's not crowded with college students, appreciate that you can actually get tickets to bands people have never heard of and that you have amazing venues like the Granada and the Kessler so close by. It sounds like Austin ain't in your cards so quit looking back like it's an ex-boyfriend who got away.