New friends on a budget?

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-27-2009
New friends on a budget?
5
Mon, 10-26-2009 - 7:54pm

So I'm new to this city (well, not really. I've been here a while but I've been so preoccupied that I can't believe I've been here for so long!) and I haven't really made any friends.

I had some friends through work but since I lost my job, I kind of lost my friends too. We tried but I couldn't always meet for drinks and they were in positions to do things like jump on a plane to go party/explore in another city (it was related to their work, so they could deadhead but I'd have to buy an expensive ticket- if it didn't interfere with my work!). Soon, I became just one of the people on the mailing list for jokes.

Since then, I have been a temp and it feels like I'm always on a new assignment or job searching at home (man, I struggle with budgeting, but that's another topic). People don't always want to get to know the temp and often I am just stuck in a corner to do filing with my only contact being finding my supervisor to get my time card signed. Meeting friends at work is not an option.

And it always seems like I am tripping over my budget when it comes to meeting and maintaining friendships: I can't afford to go for dinner/drinks/plays/movies, I can't afford club dues, even the library is charging for its "meetings" now and transportation... I'm a public transportation user and most of the work are in these large industrial complexes, meaning it takes me a bus to get from the complex to the express system then an express then a third bus to get from the express system to your destination. I spend 1.5-2 hours on the bus each way and they stop running early, so I am not able to just go anywhere for a free/cheap event after work.

So my budget restricts me from joining special interest groups, my schedule (needing to take any job, even an evening, and variation with every assignment) prevents places from wanting me as a volunteer...

How do you start and maintain friendships on a budget?

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-24-2007
Tue, 10-27-2009 - 4:23am

I struggle with this myself.

Kate


empty purse

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-10-2003
Tue, 10-27-2009 - 8:52am

I know its hard. I personally have made room in my budget for some "me" money. Its not much, but I tend to accumulate it and when something big comes up that I want to do (like join a dodgeball league for the winter) I have the money there to do it!


I also am in a few book clubs. The books are chosen well in advance so i can get them from the library (and often some ladies in the club will lend me their copies after they are done if I can't get them). I have no issues about telling them I don't like to spend the money for a new book, but if you do, you can always say you are trying to be green ;)


Just some ideas! Good luck!


Bex -


"Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, today is a gift -thats why its called the present."


Bex -

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-27-2009
Tue, 10-27-2009 - 11:35pm

@Kate, I probably should get to know my neighbours but they generally aren't the kind of people I associate with. I do not mean that as a value judgement (well, maybe the druggies) but since I live in a cheap building, the only ones I know/see are (a) retired and/or disabled, or (b) poor families who are struggling to just find time together - and I don't have kids. I know there's a college student apartment or two from the parties but even when I was their age, my friends and I would go to coffee shops and call it a night by 10. I'm really lame.

I probably should though. Maybe one day I can read in the laundry room while washing my clothes instead of leaving. I can't really think of how else to make the first step.

@Bex, that sounds like fun! Not sure how to find a book club of strangers, especially safely. Think I could find a group who thinks book club is reading Sophie Consella, talking and gabbing about the hilarity of the light-hearted fun?

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-17-2007
Tue, 10-27-2009 - 11:56pm

I don't care what you have to do to make friends do it. I am an old lady and all the friends I had are all gone now along with my family. The few half hearted so call friends I do have

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-02-1998
Wed, 10-28-2009 - 4:02pm
Check out your local Civic Art Gallery or even some of the smaller private galleries for exhibition openings, they are usually cost free. Check your local library for a book club, if there isn't one with the type of books you like to read, ask the librarian how you could start a book club. Check out volunteering again, you don't always have to be available all the time.