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My title pretty much says it. One of my biggest concerns when we retire, is that we end up moving, but the people in the area are not friendly, and we end up with no friends and feeling isolated.
We've never had a problem with this because, as a pastor, I've normally had people in the congregation that were friendly and we had a social life with them. This has been a blessing for us, because our experience is that most people, when you move to a new location make friends either with the childrens parents, or maybe through church. But we've been members of churches where people were not friendly. Our kids are grown, and I will no longer be "the pastor" once I retire. People living in subdivisions tend not to be friendly, and people in small towns tend NOT to be friendly. Oftentimes, they have friends. They've had the same friends for decades. They're not interested in new friends.
So anyhow, I'd be interested in comments from anyone who moved in retirement. How was it making friends?
I think you are living in the past. These days with SO MANY people retiring, looking for a new life, or a new location, its pretty easy to make new friends. There are tons of senior groups which have evolved in today's living just for this purpose. When you get older, I think you lose that snobbiness that says "waa waa I am better than you " and you see yourself as just someone getting older, looking for hobbies, adventures, things to do, places to see. There are meet up groups now. I belong to a couple of them in Phoenix and I think its very very easy to meet people, especially with your skills and outgoingness. Not to worry. If you get stuck, you can always start a group in your home, or your town, advertise it and the people will come !!! Trust me. No need to worry.
Volunteer in the schools. Just one day a week. Get to know the kids and from there you meet the parents.
Volunteer in the library if schools are not to your liking. Or the local food pantry. Whatever.
Search the internet for any hobby type groups that get together like gardening, cooking, etc.
The friends are not going to come to you..you will have to make an effort to be seen and heard.
My thought mirror Happy Texan, there are many ways to make new friends. There are so many organizations, from church groups, to school volunteering or getting involved in political activites. If you have hobbies, persue them. How about getting active in the senior center near where you will be living. Almost all cities and towns have them. Another volunteer organization would be groups at the near by hospital.
It is so easy to get accepted and make new friends, but you have to be the agressor most of the time.
My thought mirror Happy Texan, there are many ways to make new friends. There are so many organizations, from church groups, to school volunteering or getting involved in political activites. If you have hobbies, persue them. How about getting active in the senior center near where you will be living. Almost all cities and towns have them. Another volunteer organization would be groups at the near by hospital.
It is so easy to get accepted and make new friends, but you have to be the agressor most of the time.
Nita
OP making friends takes some work at getting involved with activities outside the house- agree w/ Nita's comments.
My title pretty much says it. One of my biggest concerns when we retire, is that we end up moving, but the people in the area are not friendly, and we end up with no friends and feeling isolated.
We've never had a problem with this because, as a pastor, I've normally had people in the congregation that were friendly and we had a social life with them. This has been a blessing for us, because our experience is that most people, when you move to a new location make friends either with the childrens parents, or maybe through church. But we've been members of churches where people were not friendly. Our kids are grown, and I will no longer be "the pastor" once I retire. People living in subdivisions tend not to be friendly, and people in small towns tend NOT to be friendly. Oftentimes, they have friends. They've had the same friends for decades. They're not interested in new friends.
So anyhow, I'd be interested in comments from anyone who moved in retirement. How was it making friends?
One of the things you might do when you visit a potential new location is attend a church service to see if you are compatible. I would also look on their website for social events scheduled and talk to the pastor.
I don't know how old you are but I retired at 55 and the other retirees were all from the generation before mine (the non-tech generation) mostly 68 and up. I figure it will be at least until I'm 65, when more people my age are retired before I meet people with shared interests. I'm in contact with people through clubs, groups and classes but I don't really have daytime "hang out" friends. I'm pretty much a loner, though, so it doesn't bother me as much. Had I stayed where I was it would have been the same scenario. People my age were still in the workforce and when you are retired you become more active in the daytime (when they are all working).
The other problem I see is couples attached at the hip in retirement. People I know who had their own outside interests apart from their spouses when in the workforce now don't make a move without each other. You know, I don't mind hanging out with Jane Doe but if she won't make a move without her husband tagging along, UGH.
My title pretty much says it. One of my biggest concerns when we retire, is that we end up moving, but the people in the area are not friendly, and we end up with no friends and feeling isolated.
People living in subdivisions tend not to be friendly, and people in small towns tend NOT to be friendly. Oftentimes, they have friends. They've had the same friends for decades. They're not interested in new friends.
So anyhow, I'd be interested in comments from anyone who moved in retirement. How was it making friends?
I will be retireing in about five years. But unlike many people we moved to where we intend to retire. Did it about 10 years ago. It helped that my wife and I have jobs that can be found anywhere. (I'm a Social Worker and she is an Estate Planning Attorney)
Our area is small town-we live 10 miles from a town of 5000. The people are friendly and we have found it easy to connect-thru our jobs, church and I've met three folk with whom we are good friends thru mountain biking. I think Small Town unfriendliness is a regional thing. I can't speak for your area, most small towns in the west have friendly folk-definitly the case in eastern CA.
One tip: move to an area that has retirees. My part of CA is a place where folk retire. So I have met a lot of people who have been in the area for only two to five years and they are looking for friends. The local Lutheran church (MS)* is filled with very friendly folk many of whom have only lived here for five or ten years. It's kinda funny, but there must be five or six retired pastors, who attend.
I truly believe that what it all boils down to is a great deal of research and asking a lot of the right questions. It's also an immense help if you get a good feeling for the local culture of any place you consider. Of course, the most helpful is "boot on the ground" either there or someplace similar. That may have been the advantage my wife and I had. She'd once lived only about 40 miles south of where we now live and I'd lived in places with lots of similarities in the past.
While we had previous experience right here, what experience we did have helped our decision-making process. Thankfully we haven't been disappointed and making friends has been easy and painless. But we also chose someplace in which there were plenty of others our age and enough other transplants that we shared something in common. It also added a certain cosmopolitan ingredient to our decidedly rural area that is quite refreshing.
I think the first step is to know yourself, know what you like, and what makes you happy, then go do it. I find that by being true to myself I can cut through the sheeple and attract to myself other self-thinking individuals. If you blindly follow you will get lost in the masses.
Maybe it would be helpful to attend church services, as visitors, in the towns on your list for possible retirement locations. That may be a way to see how open people are to newcomers. If they give you a warm welcome: great. And if they are standoffish, maybe that's a sign to keep on looking.
I agree with the previous poster who said that people living in areas containing a larger number of transplants may be more open to making new friends, since many of them are in the same boat as you.
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