What does your social landscape look like, and are you content with it?

In my youth social activities were everything….now I prefer to dial it down and spend my time relaxing with my gal. The weekly open mike jam sessions now take care of the social fix I still enjoy!

I’m finding that rather than rely on friends for entertainment, I go to concerts, lectures, etc. and do volunteer work, often on my own. I’ve met new people that I know through these activities. Most nights, I get some chores done, and conk out on the couch.

At 68, most of my “social network” consists of a huge number of online “friends,” a tight family group, and a few local friends some of whom are online and others of whom are not. I think I can safely say I have an online network of fairly close friends numbering about 30. My local, offline friends number only a handful, but are growing the more I get out into the community. My best friend, however, will always be my wife. : )

My closest friends are scattered throughout the state, but recently I’ve met a couple people who are local and turning out to be really awesome. I went on a hike and played in a creek with one. She led the way into the water and I was iffy, but she freaked when I saw a snake and ran up to pet it haha

My kids mean everything to me, so my social activities usually revolve around them. I shoot the breeze with other parents but it’s really not that important. The friends I’ve had throughout my life are at that point too. I know it sounds lame to someone who isn’t in my situation, but it’s bliss to me. My hubby and I go out to shows and have date nights but that’s about all I do without the kids these days. I guess as they get older I’ll venture out on my own more, but now (at ages 3 and 6) it’s all about them. My social landscape is more like a small garden or something…

I have a lot of acquaintances and one close friend. That is pretty much the story of my life. I’ve also had periods in my life when I haven’t had any close friends and although I wasn’t too terribly upset about it at the time I know through hindsight that those times were actually quite lonely for me.

Close friends are hard to find. I tend to overwhelm people if I am not careful. The people who are completely immune to being overwhelmed (among other things) are the people who are my close friends.

Over all the changes you have already mentioned, I have found family to be the most constant throughout my life.

All my friends have graduated from my college within the last 2 years. Now I’m alone. I feel like its good preparation though since most of my graduated friends feel lonely as ever now that they’ve left an institutional community and live with their parents.

man, thats pathetic.. :/

At just about your age, @nikipedia, I suddenly realized that my social network was shrinking. It was my annual Christmas card exercise that brought it to my attention. High school friends I thought I’d stay in touch with forever had already fallen away, and college friends were dropping off. A few remained (remain to this day), but by and large the number of people I felt like sending greetings to even once a year—and was able to because I still knew where they were—was getting smaller every year. And I was doing nothing to add anyone to my life.

That’s when I decided to join an organization that would help me meet new people. I’m not much of a joiner, but at the rate I was going I was likely to be a hermit by the age of 30, so I forced myself. I wanted a group that would show me a pretty broad cross-section of people and not just those with a single common interest or of a single type. In time I did succeed in adding a number of real friends to my social circle.

I’ve never been one for a gang or a crowd. I much prefer to see one friend at a time, in person, although I have kept up a few long-distance friendships and I do manage to do a group thing now and then. I am delighted that my best friends are content to get together once every month or two for lunch, dinner, a movie, or just tea and a muffin and some good conversation; more often than that, I would begin to feel crowded.

I wouldn’t mind having one or two additional friends that I see on the same basis, and I remain open to that, but I am probably not going to go much out of my way to find them. If it happens, it happens. In any case, it takes me a long while to feel close to someone—typically about ten years, although as I’ve grown older I have tried to hurry that up a little bit.

If the friends I have all disappeared from my life, I would miss them, but I probably wouldn’t work very hard at this stage to build new relationships.

[Added] I almost missed an important part of your question. Some people who are paired off seem to feel that they must do everything as a couple. In general it seems to me that such tight couples are very inward-facing and forget how to do anything as individuals. I am not like that, and I tend not to have friends who are like that. My husband is a less sociable creature than I am (and I must be somewhere out there on the skinny part of the bell curve myself); we hardly ever socialize as a couple. Pairs who are bonded together probably won’t seek my company, nor I theirs. To me, everyone is single.

I feel as though all of my “friends” are really just acquaintances.

Which is really not surprising, as the persona I project and who I am internally are very different.

I’m somewhat dissatisfied with my social landscape. All of my friends like me, and I like them, but I feel like something is missing. It really bothers me sometimes when my friends don’t like to talk about anything important. I have only one friend that likes to talk about things like international relations, religion, politics, relationships etc. He’s very smart and detailed in his answers.

One of my pet peeves is when people don’t explain enough when you ask them a question. You ask them what their trip was like, or what they think about some current event, and they give a half ass answer that didn’t tell me anything about how they feel at all. So I may try to press further, and they either seem unable to or just don’t have any further opinions beyond their single sentence answer lol.

@Carly

With their PARENTS?? WTF? Two of mine moved back home after having a child, and I made them both pay rent!

@CaptainHarley well, I don’t know if they’re paying rent or not, but none of them have kids yet. My mom has told me many times that if I come home for more than a month then I’ll have to start paying rent – and I’m totally fine with that.

@CaptainHarley, from what I’ve heard, this is a major trend. In our day, we got a job after graduation and moved out. Far fewer graduates these days are moving right into jobs, and it isn’t because they don’t want them. Some of my son’s class of 2009 law school classmates are still looking. It’s hard on everybody.

@Jeruba

Yes, I know. And I don’t like the trend. It’s not good for the young ones. If we had some people in office who gave a shit about them… but I digress. : )

@Carly

My wife raised hell with me for doing that: “I can’t believe you’re making your own children pay rent to live in their own house!” It’s not THEIR house! It’s OURS! Helllohhhh!

And this was at a time when each of the two who came back were making MORE than I was! Sheesh!