The Secrets to Making New Friends in Denver

The Platonic Ideal

We all want great friends. We just don’t know how to find them.

During his toast at my wedding, my brother made a stink about not being my best man. To prove his superiority, he then gave the guy who’d landed the gig a pop quiz. What was my favorite movie? (Notting Hill.) Who was my high school girlfriend? (Trick question—she didn’t exist.) How did I lose the peripheral vision in my left eye? (BB gun.) Finally, my brother delivered the punchline: How many friends did I have? That answer was easy. One. The best man.

I’ve always thought it was a sweet speech. Underneath all the humiliation was a subliminal declaration of love—for me, but also for my best friend and the important role he played in my life. And I wasn’t embarrassed at all. Sure, I had only one close friend, but my family was tight, I was vibing with then new co-workers in Denver, and I now had a wife who was legally obligated to hang out with me. I was thick with fulfilling relationships.

Eight years later, the bit wouldn’t be so funny. My best man and I live in different states, the work-from-home revolution means I rarely see colleagues in person, and, while my wife is wonderful, I can feel her buckling under the weight of my undivided attention. (We have this running joke when I leave the house: She asks where I’m going. I say, “Out with the boys.” We both laugh because there are no boys.)

Is my situation sad? Sure. Is it rare? Not at all. According to a 2022 data analysis from Chamber of Commerce, a national real estate and small business research company, Denver ranks 27th out of 170 on the list of the loneliest cities in America, based on its percentage of one-person households. Maybe those loners have extensive friend networks that satisfy their social needs, but the research suggests otherwise: In 1990, 33 percent of U.S. adults surveyed by Gallup said they had 10 or more close friends. Only three percent had none. By 2021, only 13 percent had 10 or more, and 12 percent couldn’t name a single close friend.

Those numbers aren’t only heartbreaking, they’re also unhealthy. Earlier this year, Robert Waldinger and Marc Schulz published The Good Life, a book culled from their work as directors of the Harvard Study of Adult Development, the world’s longest-running research project on happiness. Started in 1938, the venture has followed more than 2,000 participants over eight decades, and Waldinger and Schulz distilled the findings down to a single deduction, which they shared with the Atlantic this past January: “Good relationships lead to health and happiness.”

Good relationships encompass all sorts of dynamics. Family, of course, which you are born with, as well as romantic partners, who are only a dating app away. Friends, though, become difficult to find once we become adults, when unplanned interactions, shared vulnerability, and time (the most important ingredients for making buddies) grow scarcer. This seems especially true in Denver, where 38.9 percent of households contain one person (compared to the national average of 29 percent), and in Colorado as a whole, where more than half of residents are transplants.

“You asked if it’s exciting or anxious or whatever [to make new friends],” says Rachel Greenwald, a Denver celebrity matchmaker and the New York Times best-selling author of Find a Husband After 35 (Using What I Learned At Harvard Business School), who also researches and teaches topics surrounding nonromantic workplace relationships through the Harvard Business School. “I would say it’s just hard because, for one thing, most people in older age groups have established friendships and lives and families. Opportunities where both people have space to bring someone new into their lives are very rare.”

But it does happen. I’ve seen friends laughing together at the edge of my neighborhood playground, meeting up at a trailhead before a group run, erupting in a collective cheer when Nikola Jokić bounces a pass between his legs to (pal) Aaron Gordon. What’s their secret? To find out, we burst into their bubbles to discover how locals connect and maintain platonic relationships. What we uncovered is that making friends is scary, nerve-wracking, and awkward (basically, dating without the potential for sex). But when a match gets made, when two souls finally unite, the payoff is even better—and lasts much, much longer than with most of the clowns you meet on Hinge.

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Great Moments in Colorado Friend History
In 1980, two small planes collided over East Maroon Pass between Crested Butte and Aspen, killing all 10 passengers. In tribute, friends of the deceased spent years planning and building a cabin near the site of the crash; in 1984, the Friends’ Hut, tucked at 11,370 feet of elevation beneath the south face of Star Peak, became one of the 10th Mountain Division Hut Association’s most remote—and beautiful—lodgings.

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Desperate Measures

After attending college in Knoxville, Tennessee, where I grew up, I was eager to explore the world following graduation. Some might say overeager: I moved to six places over the subsequent 12 years. Forced to start anew half a dozen times, I’ve developed a few infallible techniques for meeting friends should you—like more than half of Coloradans—find yourself living in a strange place, desperate to meet new people. Here’s what I learned in each city.

Company Loves Misery

There wasn’t much going on in Bethlehem, a sleepy, blue-collar town, so I bonded with a colleague I thought I’d enjoy getting to know by smoking cigarettes on my back stoop with her. We’d stare forlornly at the steel mill on the horizon while wishing we lived in hipster Brooklyn two hours away.

FOMO is for real

After setting a date for drinks with a college acquaintance and a friend of hers in Washington, D.C., the former bailed. Her friend and I hung out anyway and decided to infect our mutual acquaintance with a raging case of FOMO by rolling from the bar to a house party, sending her photos along the way. My college pal never ditched me again (though, oddly, I didn’t hang out with the friend much after that).

Always Befriend The Bartenders

They probably won’t be able to socialize much—their work schedules conflict with happy hour, late night, and the in-between—but they talk to a lot of people, so they’re above-average matchmakers. In Little Rock, for example, the bartender at my local craft brewery set me up on a play date to ride bikes with another regular.

You Can Be Anyone You Want To Be

Returning from a solo mountain bike ride in Santa Fe, I found a fellow Little Rock transplant waiting by my car because he had spied my Arkansas license plate. Despite the fact that I graduated from the University of Tennessee, I pretended to be an Arkansas football fan for a few weeks to cement our burgeoning friendship.

All Is Fair In Love And Friendship

The ex-girlfriend of one of my colleagues in Santa Fe had also recently moved to Seattle, so I DMed her on Instagram. I casually asked what ski pass she and her new partner were getting, bought the same one, and messaged them anytime the forecast called for snow. We skied all winter, and our bond got so hot (platonically speaking) that we spent the summer backpacking and tubing on the lake together.

Have Your CV Ready

A member of my D.C. crew moved to the Mile High City around the same time I did, and during a happy hour that felt more like a job interview, she grilled me about my biking and skiing skills. Fortunately, I impressed: She offered me the position of being her husband’s new adventure buddy.

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Pals in a Pod

Both Olympic distance runners, Kara Goucher and Des Linden traveled in the same circles for years but were only acquaintances until this past January, when they launched Nobody Asked Us with Des & Kara, a semimonthly podcast on running. “I’m in my 40s, and she was 39,” says Goucher, who lives in Boulder. “Meeting a new friend at that age is awkward. It’s kind of like dating: I think I like you.” How did they overcome that discomfort to build a relationship that goes much deeper than 23 episodes (and counting)? By relying on ingredients experts agree are essential when forging a friendship.

1. Unplanned Interactions

In 2020, Goucher, who had retired as a professional runner, attended the U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials, where Goucher finished fourth. After the race, Goucher and Linden, who lives in Michigan, bumped into each other in the lobby of the hotel where they were both staying. The pair decided to turn the chance encounter into an after-party, heading to a bar for some late-night cocktails. “That was the first time we had ever had a real conversation that wasn’t at a starting line or a finish line or a press conference,” Goucher says.

2. Shared Vulnerability

Goucher once trained with the Oregon Project, a running team funded by Nike and coached by the famed Alberto Salazar. To outsiders, it seemed like an ideal environment. But in Goucher’s 2023 book, The Longest Race: Inside the Secret World of Abuse, Doping, and Deception on Nike’s Elite Running Team, she claims Salazar pressured her to take medication to lose weight, oversaw doping activities on the team, and sexually assaulted her during massages. (Salazar denies the allegations.) In 2013, Goucher began speaking to the United States Anti-Doping Agency, which banned Salazar in 2019, but her cooperation came at a cost. “There were people in the sport who were not nice to me, who didn’t want to be around me,” Goucher says. “And Des never did that.” At the 2020 Olympic trials, Linden asked about Goucher’s experiences. “I was like, ‘Everything’s on the table,’  ” Goucher says. “I just trusted her. I felt a lot of respect from her. I knew she believed me, and I don’t always feel that way.”

3. Time Together

Goucher thought that asking Linden to be friends outright would have been embarrassing. So floating the idea of a podcast about running (from the business of the sport to tips for recreationists) was, in part, her way of gauging whether Linden was interested in continuing to hang out. “That was kind of the awkward, want-to-be-friends-with-me? part,” Goucher says. Since launching Nobody Asked Us in January 2023, Goucher and Linden have logged more than 20 studio hours together, from the first episode’s nervy first-date questions (“How did you find running?”) to number 18’s familiar catch-up on family dynamics (“How is your brand-new bearded dragon?”). “It’s two people who think they want to be friends,” Goucher says, “really dive in, and find out if they do.”

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Great Moments in Colorado Friend History
During the 2022 offseason, Aaron Gordon surprised Denver Nuggets teammate Nikola Jokić by attending one of the MVP’s Serbian national team games in Prague. “I just wanted to let him know that he got a brother,” Gordon told ESPN, “no matter where he is in the world.”

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Till Death Do Them Part

My parents got divorced 15 years ago. So why do they still hang out all the time?

With yellowing floral wallpaper in the kitchen and faux wood paneling in the living room, the Lakewood ranch house I grew up in looked like the set of a 1970s sitcom. The life inside felt like one, too. My dad was the funny, easygoing parent who would help me with math homework and let me, then only 10 years old, watch PG-13 movies. My mom, on the other hand, was strict—a Chilean immigrant with a thick accent and a stern look. They were Sam and Diane, Lucy and Ricky, Uncle Jesse and Aunt Becky: opposites who, together, formed a perfect whole.

Then, seemingly out of nowhere, my mom sat me down on our gigantic La-Z-Boy recliner one evening and told me that, after a decade of marriage, my dad was moving out. Naturally, I was worried. Would I spend my formative years in a McDonald’s parking lot hopping from my mom’s car to my dad’s? What about Christmas, which would arrive soon? Would I unwrap presents from my mom in front of that fake paneling before heading to my dad’s barren one-bedroom for Chinese takeout?

My questions were answered soon after, when my dad began dropping by the house for dinner and Monopoly so I could catch him up on the latest fifth-grade drama. The three of us spent Christmas together. My mom even helped him pick out furniture for his new place. And the togetherness continued in the years following their breakup: Every Sunday morning during high school, my mom, my dad, and I would grab brunch at the Village Inn down the road.

After I moved out, I figured that would be it. My parents had done an admirable job keeping their relationship cordial for my benefit, but surely the seams would begin to tear without their daughter’s presence to hold them together. But six years later, their friendship has never wavered. When I visit my mom now, she’ll often ignore me in favor of laughing at a (not-that-funny) Facebook meme my dad sent her. Occasionally, I’ll get a selfie of them together at the movies. They still frequent our Village Inn—usually without me.

A few weeks ago, I asked them why they stayed friends after the divorce. “I think we’re soulmates,” my dad said, “even if we’re not romantic ones.” My mom’s response was less effusive: “He’s a nice guy.” My friends are certain they carry on a secret romance, but I don’t think so. Both are still single, and the 15-year friendship they’ve maintained has taught me that relationships evolve. Casts change, new plotlines emerge, sets get remade. If you have chemistry, though, the show goes on.

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Like at First Sight

It might be unfair, but first impressions often decide the fate of a friendship, says Denver celebrity matchmaker Rachel Greenwald. Here are some tips that just might land you a second play date.

Break the mirror
Oh, you’ve been to New York? Well, I’ve been to New York, too! Let me tell you all about it! That’s a conversational habit called mirroring, and it’s off-putting because it wrestles the microphone out of your prospective bestie’s hands. Instead, focus on support responses such as, “Oh? Tell me more.”

Button up
Body language is the most important cue for conveying interest. “Stand belly button to belly button with someone so that they know they have your full attention,” Greenwald says. And keep your phone in your pocket.

Compliments aren’t just for copulating
People like people who like them, so even though you just want to keep things chummy, don’t be afraid to give compliments. “ ‘I noticed you were really nice to the barista,’ ” Greenwald says as an example. “ ‘That’s really cool.’ Or, ‘Wow, those are really cool earrings. Where did you get them?’ Those are verbal cues that you like the person.”

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With Friends Like This

We all have that friend. The one who ditches you for the cooler kids, says things that make you shudder, and pretends to be an out-of-control teen so they can appear on Maury. OK, that last example is unique to South Park’s Eric Cartman. Still, despite all of Cartman’s deviousness, Colorado’s favorite sons—Kyle Broflovski, Stan Marsh, and Kenny McCormick—continue to include the villainous fourth grader in their social circle. Why? To find out, 5280 (with the help of ChatGPT) asked Kyle, Stan, and Kenny for insight into the dynamics of their infamous foursome.

5280: Why are you friends with Cartman after all the shit he pulls?

Kyle Broflovski: (Sighs) You know, it’s kind of a mystery even to us sometimes. Cartman can be infuriating, offensive, and just plain mean. But deep down, there’s a history there. We’ve known each other forever, and I guess we’ve just been through so much together that it’s hard to completely let go.

Stan Marsh: Yeah, it’s like no matter how messed up things get, Cartman is still part of our group. He’s been with us since the beginning, and even though he’s a total jerk most of the time, there are moments when he’s not so bad.

Kenny McCormick: (muffled) Mph.

Stan Marsh: Yeah, it’s like no matter how messed up things get, Cartman is still part of our group. He’s been with us since the beginning, and even though he’s a total jerk most of the time, there are moments when he’s not so bad.

Kenny McCormick: (muffled) Mph.

Kyle: Kenny’s right. Despite his flaws, Cartman has his moments. And there have been times when he’s actually helped us out in his own messed-up way.

Stan: Like that time he saved us from that evil robot at the amusement park.

Kyle: And the time he helped us expose that conspiracy with the cows.

Kenny: (muffled) Mph.

Kyle: Of course, there’s also the fact that we’ve tried to ditch him before, but somehow, he always manages to weasel his way back in.

Stan: Yeah, like that time we tried to replace him with Token.

Kyle: But in the end, I think it’s just part of the dynamic. We’ve all got our roles, and as much as Cartman drives us crazy, he’s still our friend in some twisted, messed-up way.

Kenny: (muffled) Mph.

Stan: And you know what? No matter how crazy things get, we know we can count on each other. Cartman’s like that annoying family member you can’t quite cut ties with.

Kyle: Exactly. We might not always understand it, but it’s our own weird version of friendship.

Kenny: (muffled) Mph.

Stan: Yeah, Kenny, you’ve got a point. It’s like he’s a necessary evil in our lives.

Kyle: And who knows? Maybe someday he’ll actually change. But until then, we’re stuck with him, for better or worse.

Kenny: (muffled) Mph.

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Rules For A Campfire*

*Campfire is a metaphor for friendship.

Like many men of a certain age, Brian Carroll and Tyson Williams have a difficult time talking sincerely about their relationship. “I don’t really like him at all,” Carroll says. “I don’t know why we’re having this conversation.” Williams claims to daydream about murdering Carroll. “There are times when he’s building a raging campfire and I’m just like, ‘Ahhhhhh,’  ” Williams says, miming pushing his friend into the blaze. “But I don’t because—prison.”

The truth is that Carroll and Williams became adventure buddies soon after meeting in Boulder in 2010, forging an intimate partnership based on exploring—and surviving—some of the most remote and rugged wilderness areas in the West. During those outings, the pair dreamed up three rules for a campfire, which, they say, is a metaphorical guide to maintaining their friendship. (Note: Not pushing your friend into the blaze is an unwritten rule.)

1. Don’t Put Too Much Fuel Into The Fire

This is important in a literal sense because of wildfires. It’s important in a figurative sense because adventuring too hard can lead to hanging off the side of an unstable scree field in the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness Area in Idaho. “That’s the closest I’ve ever come to dying with Brian,” Williams says. “We put way too much in on that one.” Both military veterans, Carroll and Williams now think of themselves as each other’s battle buddy—the fellow soldier you pair up with to help keep you safe. “It’s their job to get you back,” Carroll says.

2. Stoke The Spark

Just like a fire, you must tend to a friendship to keep it from extinguishing. “What we started doing years ago,” Carroll says, “is planning a trip every month. Maybe it didn’t happen every month, but there was always something on the calendar.” Although Williams moved to Durango in 2020, the pair continue to plot quarterly excursions over happy hour Zoom calls. The upkeep of their relationship, however, sometimes requires off-trail maintenance. When Carroll turned up at Williams’ Durango home for a visit, for example, he found his friend doubled over with a severe stomach bug. “Brian’s like, ‘Don’t worry, I got you,’  ” Williams says. “Brian proceeded to cook for the next three or four days while I was trying not to vomit on my own child.”

3. Don’t Give Up In The Rain

If you’re camping without a tent in New Mexico’s Pecos Wilderness—and it’s 40 degrees and raining like God’s on a cleaning jag—“don’t let that fire die out,” Williams says, “because your life literally depends on it.” The same could be said of their friendship’s importance to their mental health. In 2022, Williams put his backcountry forays on pause following the birth of his first child, but withdrawing from nature took a toll on his well-being. At the urging of his wife, Williams called Carroll for a bike-packing trip to Wheeler Geologic Area (and its 28 million-year-old volcanic fields) near Creede. The trip was an emotional reset for Williams—and proof that although he felt removed and alone, Carroll was still there to support him. “By the end,” Williams says, “I was ready to get back home and see my family.”

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Great Moments in Colorado Friend History
In 2018, friends Jessie Danielson, Faith Winter, Brittany Pettersen, Tammy Story, and Kerry Donovan all won election to the Colorado Senate. Dubbed the “Fab Five,” the Democrats formed a text chain during the race, which was particularly helpful when attack ads targeted one of the candidates. “Our families are incredibly supportive,” Winter told People, “but it’s not their name on the thousands of pieces of mail going out or on the TV, so being able to talk to [the other candidates] going through the exact same thing…was so supportive.”

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Friends With Benefits

Platonic relationships don’t just reward those involved; society reaps some sweet returns, too. Here, three examples of friendships that benefited Coloradans—and plenty of other people.

Henry O. Wagoner and Barney Ford

The Meet-Cute: Henry O. Wagoner met Barney Ford in the 1840s in Chicago after the latter arrived in town on the Underground Railroad—and promptly married Wagoner’s sister.

The Relationship: After relocating to Denver, Wagoner and Ford became two of the most successful entrepreneurs in territorial Colorado. Both focused mainly on hospitality (with Ford operating the elegant Inter-Ocean Hotel in Denver) and eventually counted themselves among the wealthiest Black residents of the state.

The Benefits: The friends were passionate about politics, notably lobbying Congress against statehood in 1862 if Black men were not granted the right to vote and for the successful 1867 legislation that prevented restrictions on male suffrage in U.S. territories. Advocates for equal education, Ford and Wagoner also opened a school for Black children in Denver in the 1870s.

Sheryl McCallum and David Nehls

The Meet-Cute: In the late 1990s, Denverite Sheryl McCallum performed a few readings of composer David Nehls’ then-in-development The Great American Trailer Park Musical in New York City. More than a decade later, during a visit to the Mile High City, McCallum attended an audition at the Denver Performing Arts Complex, where she was surprised to see Nehls, who had relocated to the state and was working as a musical director, behind the piano.

The Relationship: When McCallum moved back to Denver in 2014, Nehls, then the musical director at the Arvada Center, cast her in a production of I’ll Be Home for Christmas. “I thank David for getting me into the larger Denver theater scene,” McCallum says. “Denver was a tough nut to crack. But with David already being here and us having some history back in New York, whenever he did something, he would let me know. I got in the room because of Mr. Nehls.”

The Benefits: McCallum and Nehls co-wrote Miss Rhythm—The Legend of Ruth Brown, a DCPA production in which McCallum tells the story and performs the songs of the R&B singer “who built Atlantic Records,” according to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. The show ran for six months this year, from May through October, at Garner Galleria Theatre.

Edward White Jr. and Jack Kerouac

The Meet-Cute: During the 1940s, Denver native Edward White Jr. attended Columbia University in New York City, where he became close friends with Beat Generation pioneer Jack Kerouac.

The Relationship: In 1947, Kerouac traveled by bus and then hitchhiked to visit White in Denver, a trip that became the basis for the author’s seminal On the Road; White is portrayed by the character Tim Gray in the book. White, who died in 2017 at the age of 92, became a lauded architect who designed some of Denver’s most iconic buildings, including the Denver Botanic Gardens’ Boettcher Memorial Tropical Conservancy.

The Benefits: Despite his architectural achievements, White’s greatest contribution to art might be inspiring Kerouac’s signature style. “By the way,” Kerouac wrote to White before the writer’s death in 1969, “you started a whole new movement of American literature (spontaneous prose & poetry) when in that Chinese restaurant on 125th street one night you told me to start SKETCHING in the streets….”

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Great Moments in Colorado Friend History
In 2017, an Arapahoe Basin skier got stuck on a lift when his backpack became entangled with the chair, leaving him unconscious and dangling from the neck. Mickey Wilson, an accomplished slackliner, climbed the lift tower and shimmied roughly 30 feet along a cable to cut his buddy free. “I told people not to use the ‘H’ word,” Wilson told the Denver Post. “I’m not a hero, I’m just a slackliner.”

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10 Ways to Leave Your Friend

You can send a text, Rex. Drop it in the mail, Gail. You don’t need to tarry, Mary. Just get yourself free.

Katherine Sleadd has lost a lot of friends. There was the middle school lip-sync contest partner who—with another girl listening in on three-way calling!—told Sleadd that her mom had forced her to be friends with her out of pity. As an adult, Sleadd split with someone over a dispute about a rental car (which, as you’ll see, wasn’t really about the rental car) in the United Kingdom. One chum got a little too close to Sleadd’s husband for Sleadd’s liking.

At this point in the story, you might be saying to yourself, “Wow, she sounds like a bad friend.” Sleadd had the same thought, so the Denver-based trauma-informed life coach wrote How to Be a Bad Friend: The Hidden Life of Failed Relationships, published in April of this year. In the book, Sleadd outlines 10 archetypes, from “Clueless Friend” to “Jealous Friend,” using her stories as anecdotes. But rather than teaching readers how to be malicious, Sleadd asks them to consider why we hurt the ones we like. “How aware are we of our own needs and desires in friendship,” she says, “or how much are we operating on what we’ve been told to want when it comes to certain relationships?”

The last thing we want to be, for example, is a difficult friend. Yet that’s what Sleadd was in the U.K., where the requirements for renting a car proved more complicated than she and her two companions had expected. When her friends balked and advocated for a bus, Sleadd refused to budge. In fact, she told them they could go ahead, but she was going “to rent the fucking car.” Sleadd got the keys after hours of wrangling at the agency while her friends stewed, one later telling Sleadd she was “just a kid with shit to prove.”

In a way, the friend was right. Following the lip-sync contest embarrassment, Sleadd internalized that all she needed to do to keep connections was avoid inconveniencing others. “The truth is, difficult women are connected to their bodies and selves,” Sleadd writes. “The only reason we learned to call them difficult is because conformity demanded of women…to deny all their needs and desires in exchange for ‘love’ and safety.” But Sleadd couldn’t deny herself in the U.K. because she knew that traveling overseas would be a rare occurrence in her life. She was willing to let her friendship die on that hill.

And it did. After being called a kid, Sleadd responded by saying that maybe the friend was just mad that her own children didn’t listen to her. She’s not proud of the jab—or of being difficult—but, Sleadd writes, “I showed up as true to who I was in that moment as I could, resentment included, after spending many years compromising myself to put other people at ease. It was difficult. I was difficult. This story is difficult.” But she had to be a bad friend, she believes, to become a more complete person.

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Decrypting Girl Code

Strangers one day, ride-or-dies the next, kids seem to know the mystical secrets to locking down friends, which is why we asked Leila Parsons and Anna Skavish, nine-year-old Front Range BFFs, for insights into relationship building.

On making friends:

Leila: “It’s easier to become friends when you have a topic to talk about. Me and Anna usually just start a conversation by talking about a cartwheel in gymnastics.”

Anna: “Yeah, if you don’t share that many interests, you have to search to find even the littlest thing to talk about. Like, maybe the other person likes pasta?”

On fighting with friends:

Anna: “You can’t hang on to something that happened. You have to throw it into the garbage can and let the garbage man take it away.”

Leila: “We’ve had plenty of fights. But, like, two seconds later we’re best friends. Classic girl code.”

On why adults have a hard time keeping friends:

Anna: “Probably because they need to be nicer to each other. When you’re with your friends, you have to make sure you let go of the rest of your life and try to make them feel good.”

Leila: “So Anna might say my outfit looks awesome when she thinks it’s terrible. That’s just so I don’t feel bad because of her.”