Short story: people change.
Once most of my friends started posting pictures on Facespace of the dinner they ate at Applebee's instead of the stupid shit we used to do... I started wrenching on my own again (only child, grew up in the country). So we'd send each other pictures via text of stuff we were working on. Sometimes it was something cool, sometimes it was of a destroyed brake rotor or something similarly not interesting. Slowly the pictures of Applebee's dinner on Facespace turned to pictures of infants people were having on purpose (as opposed to "surprise!"). They started sending pictures of them destroying a bathroom vanity and putting in crooked flooring. Slowly the texting happens less and less because there are few similarities. They can't afford to do anything but keep their offspring alive and if they could they wouldn't have time because they choose to pour everything into their kid(s). Eventually they start working their way out of the hole and start sending pictures of some cheap Chinese child's ATV's dysfunctions but I've largely moved on.
I am now physically very close to three people that I used to wrench with. Meaning twenty minutes or less. Haven't seen them in years.
Where I work I am the most hillbilly of them all. Most of the people I work with pay people to do things, some even pay others to take care of their lawn. They talk about sports, my eyes glaze over. One old guy works on cars but he doesn't know what he's doing (parts changer) and there is another guy my age that I'm friends with but he's not as mechanically inclined so I end up doing most of the work but he is a lot of fun (and busy) to work with... but I wouldn't call it wrenching.
I was one of the earlier ones to get married (still late by oldtimer's calculations). I don't know if that changed me or not (usually it does according to studies), but I do know that my wife is largely disinterested in anything I do except boats. So I wrench alone. I slowly switched from vehicles to boats and campers/RVs. My wife is an extrovert so if anything I'm more likely to be social due to her outgoing-ness and whatnot.
If there is anything that probably makes it the most difficult is that we have a decent amount of disposable income. Like more than a family's gross income for our area according to the census. Most of my friends and all of my wife's friends I make more than the three of them combined, plus we have no resource vampires (children). So largely we are in a different socioeconomic class which I am aware of but my wife sometimes forgets. It can be kind of awkward sometimes and can strain the relationships because we don't have to think about a budget for little Bobby's hockey gear. Some of my wife's oldest friends have said something to me about it before. Nearly-old white women like to go shopping and my wife doesn't really have to pine over things if she wants them (and will use them, otherwise she gets scolded).
I kind of like to set my own pace when working on stuff which isn't the fastest but I don't stop all day. Difficult to find someone to wrench with that has more than a 2-hour block of time available.
I have one friend that is great to wrench with but he lives in Las Vegas. Usually see him once a year. We send pictures of stupid shit we're doing all the time, usually daily.
