Teresa Konopka is an airplane design safety engineer. Her Boeing job in Everett is demanding, but not all-consuming.
The 24-year-old, who lives in Lynnwood, has some time for fun. Her aim is to spend that precious leisure time making friends in Snohomish County. Driving to Seattle — battling traffic and spending a fortune to park — isn’t her idea of a good time.
“I work in Everett and realized a lot of co-workers my age, in their 20s, choose to live in Seattle and commute simply because they feel there is a lack of social life up north,” she wrote in a recent email to The Herald.
Konopka, originally from New York City, was letting us know about her effort to improve the social scene here. “I created my own Meetup where young professionals can have fun with people their own age — while staying local,” she wrote.
She has started a group on the Meetup.com website called “20s Friends Up-North (Everett, Lynnwood, Snohomish, etc).” As of Thursday, 15 people had signed up. Some of the activities listed are an ice cream sampling, this weekend’s Fresh Paint art festival on the Everett waterfront, and an Aug. 22 Bubble Run in downtown Everett.
Describing what “We’re About” on the website, Konopka listed “new in town, social networking, wellness, adventure, dining out, making friends in our community” and other interests. What isn’t listed is dating. “For me, it’s just a thing to go have fun,” she said.
When she started the group, anyone could join. Now, potential members must post a picture and be approved. People from middle age on into their 60s were signing up, she said. When Konopka checked them out online, she found many were also on dating websites. The “20s Friends Up-North” page now says, “Please only join if you are in your 20s.”
Twentysomethings are apt to look for fun in Seattle without giving a thought to what’s up in Snohomish County.
Konopka hopes they’ll reconsider.
“There is stuff going on, and a lot of it is free,” said Konopka, who is no fan of the bar scene. “People my age associate social life and night life,” she said. Konopka prefers daytime activities, and likes doing things with others — “just a nice group of friends.”
For newcomers, making friends isn’t automatic. Konopka believes there’s truth to the notion of the infamous “Seattle Freeze.” It’s the belief that people here are polite, but not all that interested in forming new friendships.
“I would say it does exist,” said Konopka, who lives in an apartment complex and volunteers with PAWS, the animal welfare group in Lynnwood.
She’s accustomed to the blunt manner of New York, where if people don’t want to do something they’ll say so.
“Here, they will say yes, then cancel at the last minute,” she said.
Most of her co-workers are older, married and at different stages in life than she is. “Some people still think I’m the intern,” said Konopka, who earned her engineering degree at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, a private research university in upstate New York.
Her interest in aerospace was fueled by a field trip during a high school science camp to a Boeing facility near Philadelphia. “It was a helicopter factory. I saw that, it was all over,” Konopka said. Now, her work includes assuring that systems on the 777, and soon the 777X, are capable of withstanding lightning or explosives.
She chose to live in Snohomish County rather than Seattle to cut down on commute time. She likes the activities around here. And she’s sure others her age want to get out and enjoy what this place has to offer. She’s looking for community, not singles bars or speed dating.
“I’d rather make friends the old-fashioned way,” she said. Surely she’s not the only one.
Julie Muhlstein: 425-339-3460; jmuhlstein@heraldnet.com.
Meetup group
Learn about the “20s Friends Up-North” Meetup group for young professionals in Snohomish County at: www.meetup.com/20s-Friends-Up-North/
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