And then there were two

I have several groups of people that I hang out with and one is the Ironwood Ladies.

We are a group of older women who live, or once lived in the same apartment complex. Our ages are within a year of each other except for one of us who is 81 and the spryest one of all.

Today we were supposed to get together for breakfast at a local cafe and I got there first. I didn't sit down because I wasn't sure how many seats we needed.

On a good day there could be nine of us.

Today there were two.

May's daughter, who lives on a private island injured her back exercising and had to hire an airplane to get to the doctor. She needed her mother. (And this knocked off the two women who sometimes come with her.)

Martha stayed up late last night emailing about the goose poop littering her walk and needed to sleep in.

Clancy and Fran, two sisters who often come together, had to go to the hospital because Clancy's twelfth grandchild was born this morning.

Beth has disappeared. Maybe to her quarrelsome daughter's house where a new grandchild appeared a month ago, and maybe she had to reschedule a dialysis treatment, and maybe she just changed her mind!

That left me and Anna Marie and she was late because of a freight train that may still be parked across Linden for all we know and all the other people who accosted her to tell her why they wouldn't be coming.

But . . . two for tea, or coffee and pancakes, is still pretty good.