[SamBam]

But people have had activities that take up their time since time immemorial. But the "friendship recession" seems to be much newer.

FWIW, my friend recently built a summer home. I went over about four weekends to help drywall, put in flooring, build stud walls, etc. He's had other friends over other weekends. Sometimes it's just one friend, sometimes a few of us go up together. It's a great time, and definitely strengthens our social bonds.

I'm also friends with my kids' parents (one of whom is the one with the house). Playdates turn into dinner invites.

I think we're lucky that we're on the older end -- mid-40s -- so maybe we had time to work our social muscles before social media and Netflix, and have socialization as an expectation.

I'm also personally lucky I have a wife who does a lot of the social reaching-out. For whatever reason, this seems like it's more and more a gendered role, and I'm definitely worse at it -- if I were a bachelor I'd probably be happy staying home alone much more, to my long-term detriment.

[7thaccount]

I think you're right that those of us that had to socialize either before or when the Internet was more in its infancy are just a lot more used to small talk and meet ups. I've noticed younger family members seem to not value that kind of community. The boomers and their parents would say the same about my generation as we have nothing on them. That's literally all they do is drink beer with friends and socialize at various clubs. D&D is the closest equivalent that the younger generation has and half of the people I see playing at my local game shop have gray hair.