The fact that context matters so much makes it hard to avoid concluding that such relationships are not friendships in any sense of the word, they're just pleasantries to make the other parts of the context - the reason why you're in whatever situation - go more smoothly. Agreeableness. More agreeable with some people than others, sure, but not friends.

Without context - it’s true.

However I do have an autistic trait that makes me forget easily people and things without context. My spouse regularly nags me to touch base with family as I just have my attention elsewhere. Tried various “friend managers” but they didn’t work as I rather pursue software than people.

E.g. I had multi year relationship when I gamed. I stopped gaming as much and those relationships deteriorated. I am godfather of son of a friend with whom I studied. Since we graduated we met twice or thrice.

And I know many people that go like that. Men’s friendships usually evolve around “do” rather than “discuss”. If there’s no shared “do” they fade away. Add above trait (which isn’t THAT uncommon) and building long term contextless relationship is very difficult.

I agree. When it comes to friends, I don't think I've ever made one because of a specific "cool" trait they had. People like each other because they are generally "cool", and what's cool can mean different things to different people. Most of the time, people will like you for merely being receptive, reciprocal, and empathetic. You don't need to have interesting hobbies or lots of knowledge in history, or romantic success, or whatever. While those can certainly make a person more interesting, it can be surprising how little they actually matter.

On the other hand, I do understand where people are coming from when they conclude that their lack of friends must be a result of being "uncool." Although what I just said was spoken with sincerity, I still can't help but wonder why people seem to like me. I'm a pretty lousy storyteller, I've only ever visited 2 other countries, my hobbies are overly intellectual, I don't play many video games or watch any shows that are in vogue, and even if I manage to come up with a funny joke I always screw up the delivery. Yet I'm still liked.

The feeling of lacking coolness, I think, probably stems from a lack of self esteem induced from childhood or adolescence. If I didn't have such a hard time as a kid, being awkward and weird, maybe my likability wouldn't be constantly in question even as an otherwise confident adult. My early experiences cemented in my mind that I'm fundamentally an outsider and not cool. The irony is that those "cool" people from my childhood either ended up as average joes and janes, or became the very antithesis of cool.