I've lived in Tampa now for about four years, and the one, consistent complaint that I hear from a lot of people I talk to is that, unless you're pretty heavily into the bar scene, it's really hard to meet people. I can totally attest to that. I've finally gotten to the point, within the past year or so, where I can confidently say that I've met some wonderful friends. But it took about three years of searching and trying different things to get to this point. Meanwhile, I'm still searching. I've always firmly believed in quality of friends over the quantity of friends, and much with like men, where they say you gotta kiss a lot of frogs to find your prince...well I think you have to sit through a lot of lame lunches, bowling, women's groups, gym classes, etc, etc, etc to meet a quality friend.
At the same time though, something I'm sure all our mommies told us growing up, is that you gotta be a friend to have a friend. You're completely delusional if you think that you're going to make friends by simply sitting on your couch, waiting for the phone to ring. And I'll admit, I did a lot of that for the first few years I lived here. Kept wondering why I wasn't meeting people, but I wasn't willing to put myself out there, accept invitations, extend invitations, and be an active participant in my social life. And while I will never be the social butterfly, I can easily say that I am so much happier having the type of social life I have now, one filled with breakfasts or dinners with friends. Group emails. Occasional movies or whatever else strikes our fancy than I was sitting by myself, on my couch, with my cats. BOOOOORING.
So where is this going you ask? Yeah...I often wonder that about my blog posts and conversations as well. Anyway...while I am totally happy with the way my life is turning out, I'm always looking for ways to meet new people and to hopefully extend that branch of friendship out to someone new to town who feels as lost as I felt. I'm no closer to figuring out how one goes about meeting people than I was three years ago, but I refuse to sit by and be a spectator in my life any longer. Therefore I started a few meet-up groups in the hopes of meeting people with common interests that could possibly turn into a few more quality friends.
So if you're in the South Tampa area and you're looking for ways to meet people, check out my first two meet up groups - they're nothing spectacular, but they're a start!
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