Some of the most rewarding social connections are built around common pursuits, often those outside of one's work that we usually end up doing because of material needs that need to be satisfied. So that is one advice I've encountered on many articles on friendship. After all a friend is one whom you want to be there with you -- and you with him/her -- whom you may need for matters in life that we can only share with those with whom we have developed a certain level of Mutual trust and openness, call it both-sided Equal level of vulnerability -- with our fears, questions, weaknesses, uncertainties and all such things we won't open to with someone we meet at work or bar at events, unless these are around themes to bring people together with at least one major common purpose. This is why starting with places where you have at least One thing strongly in common with another person, there is not even a possibility of Starting off a conversation, let alone friendship.

This is what I pursue in my current efforts for finding friends, this is what makes sense, this is waht experts on friendship seem to agree upon.

Good luck!

(BTW since women live longer than men they have a legitimate fear of becoming a caretaker of a husband in late life. So I'm surprised your experience was the opposite of what I know.)

(did u notice there was such high interest in your post? It mirrors the need for friendship/socially mutually rewarding connections, something even the Surgeon General has tirelessly spoken of as a crisis that infects the nation withj various health consequences specially of mental health.)