The Origination of a Social Life

So, a couple folks have asked me how I started my gals group.

Since it's pretty obvious (to me at least) that there seems to be a dearth of socialization options for retired gals, I figured I would share how my group came about, although I am defiitely not the queen of such things and it happened by accident. It was an evolution and as such this post may be a bit long, forewarned and all that.

Don't get me wrong, I had socialization opportunities before this. I belonged to a knitting and occasioonal craft group that met once a week and I was also involved with a church. But the senior "offerings" in my community were much less than when I was in Texas (where each town had it's own senior center that included daily lunch, arts and crafts stuff and tours). The local recreation group seemd very cliquish, I mean if you sat down to lunch with them they would tell you that was so and so's chair and tell you to leave. 

There were Meetup groups but they were either really large, required me to go downtown, go out in the evening or else be an active "looking" single. None of which were my thing. I was looking to hang out with other gals, in my area. Married women, single women, women.

With these thoughts in my head, I made a comment on my local Word of Mouth Facebook page(for non FB users this is kind of like Next Door, a page for asking for recommendtions, finding out about social events and so on. Neighborly stuff).  I said, "If were to start a group for women of a certain age, what would I call it". Let's just say the response was immediate and extreme. The "I want to join your group" comment out weighed the name suggestions by ten to one. So an idea was born, but really, I had no idea what I was doing.

The next day, I started a Facebook group and invited some of the women who were interested to come. Still having absolutely no idea what I was doing, I invited everyone to our local independent coffee house on a Friday afternoon. Over twenty people showed up, and an idea was born, as they say. In the beginning we were a small group. Sometimes ten for happy hour, sometimes four (always at the same place in those days). We had the occasional lunch, happy hour, or day trip. Once in awhile we did a craft type thing. We always stayed in our neighborhood, we always did things only in the day time, and the group grew slowly and by word of mouth.

The group probably could have stayed as it was, and gone along fine with that small group of people. But since everyone heard about it liked it, and I knew there was a demand, I made a big jump. I also did not want to limit the group to only retired women who do social media. If you are not into FB, that should not limit you.  And finally,  I come from the school of thought that a large pool means a greater chance for small side groups and one on one friendship options outside the group-and that has turned out to be true.

Another gal and I began a Meetup Group. We were specific in the description. We were retired or mainly retired. We did things on the weekdays with an occasional exception for a weekend matinee or brunch. We were equally divided between married and singles (this was not a widows/singles group only and never has been), we stayed in our large suburb. You could join from anywhere but we were not going to downtown Denver for lunch.

Since then, the group has grown. I did not know how to use Meetup but I learned quickly and it is frightenly simple. We are a diverse group of women who always have a good time. We come from all different backgrounds and our finances are all over the map. One of the gals I do things with the most is a staunch Republican. We do not EVER discuss poliitcs (although we do discuss some things non-politically like health care and medicare and homlessness), and we do not EVER discuss religion (although many of us belong to churches and so on where there are community and senior events and we share them).

Right now we have a weekly happy hour which is our most attended event (even though less than half of us drink). For whatever reason from four to six is a good time of day for retired women to gather. I think it's because we've done our volunteering/shopping/working out/doing things around the house/taking care of grandkids/fill in the blank and are ready for down time.  We also do one other thing a week.

It needs to be said.  Most weeks, those two  'things' are hosted by me, and I attend. This is my primary social outlet other than an occasional knitting group and church events and I'm still at home more than I am out and about. I took the first step because I wanted things to do and people to do them with for myself. And I'm comfortable doing those two things  week because I generally get to choose what they are.

Next week it's pottery painting on Tuesday and happy hour on Thursday, just as an example. The following week there is lunch at an Indian place one day and Thurday happy hour. This works for me because I am a 'doer". Someone who was not a doer would do something less. There is a similar group in the next suburb that does something less than once a week. Because I am  doer as well as someone who tries to limit her spending, most of our events are low spend or option spend. You can have just a drink at happy hour or eat. You can go to the movies for five dollars. You can have coffee and conversation. You can meet for knitting and crafting and just get a coffee.

As the group has developed, there are other people who have slowly stepped up. One woman does a lunch and a craft event every month. And people jumped in to host events for the ten days that I will be gone. This is not as important to me in the short run as I generally enjoy hosting the events, but as I look to move next year my goal is to get more members involved so that maybe, possibly this group does not die when I leave.

The Meetup group was formed in May. As of today there are 170 members (not all of whom participate and I am about to weed them out). Our happy hours usually are around twenty people, but our last coffee and crafting group (coloring, knitting, making cards) had only six or seven. Some people come almost every week, some come once a month or less. We always wear nametags, identify ourselves and I welcome others. Last night we were eighteen divided into multiple tables. I watched from afar (sort of) as a new person came to a table hesitatly and was welcomed by about six people immediately, none of whom were me.

My immediate suburb is about 15 miles east and west, and we cover a similar but slightly lesser distance north and south. We go out of our immediate suburb to a couple others and I try and alternate east and west and north and south so people have things near them. I also try and go to a different place each time when it comes to food or drink but we are definitely are now into repeat mode. We rarely leave Littleton unless it is for a day trip or a special event like the bus light trips.

The only other thing that I would add is that women become friends and do things and get together outside of the group and I (and I imagine most others) don't have a problem with that. We like it. There is none of that "I saw Gail and Shari talking and sharing phone numbers about getting together later".  Good for them.  It's the nature of the beast. Some people will become closer friends and do things togeter. I neither see that as rude or as something that hurts the big group.

Basically, as you can probably tell from reading this, I had no idea what I was doing. I faked it, started something and it worked. And still works.  It's changed as it's evolved. It used to be just lunches and happy hours and now it's other things. We are going to try a book group, I told you all about the travel discussion, we do crafting days, we do five dollar movies and drinks or coffee afterwards. And occasionally we still do lunch as well as happy hours. Because eating and conversation, they just go so well together.

I'm not technologically advanced. I'm actully not even  a social butterfly. I'm not an introvert, or maybe I'm a social introvert. I can be the least talkative one in a group. But I figured I would take a chance and the chance worked. I imagine someone could do this in a group. While there are downsides to me being the only one the upside is that I'm deciding ninety percent of the stuff. Meaning I'm doing stuff I want to do. 

Obviously how well this would work for someone else would depend on the geographic area, the size of the town what your goals were and so many things. 

If someone were to interview me and ask me why we were as great a group as we are, my first comment would be because we all like each other and we don't care if people are like us. We aren't a liberal group or a conservative group, a singles group or a widows group. We aren't just for people who like to go to the movies or play cards. Our only qualifier is that we are all women who live in Littleton who like to talk to, visit with and meet with other women in our general area and during the day. With the exception of politics and religion, almost anything goes (we do try and avoid the husband/grandchildren discussion as much as possible).  And it works for us.

If you were one of the people who asked me about this group or how I got it started and the process, I hope this helps in some small way.........And if I ran on too much, I promise to have a much shorter post next time.