Statistically Sucky

Today was one of those pewter sky days with fog so thick you have to use windshield wipers. The sun never peaked out. It was just fine. Perfect in its own way.

Ten of us girls who grew up in a place very much like Mayberry hidden in the middle of the cornfields in Western Illinois, got in contact with each other again in recent years. We didn't reconnect at our five year reunion or even our ten year reunion, but sometime after the reunions didn't really have years attached to them anymore. We connected years after there was any motivation to prove anything to each other.

Today I learned that one of the ten of us has a particularly nasty form of cancer.

Two of our group are currently fighting cancer. Two have MS. Two have fibromyalgia. Two have lived through the death of a child. Almost everyone has lost at least one parent. Two of us have been married more than once. One has never succumbed to marriage. Three have grand children. To my knowledge no one is gay. I don't really know how "average" our statistics are, but lots of them suck.

Thirty-six years ago not one of us could have guessed who'd be where today. I certainly didn't think I'd be the only one of us living outside Illinois. Who knew so many would move back to our sleepy little hometown? I seem to remember that we were all itching to get out of there.

I don't think we spent a second of worry on who might have this disease or that disease later in life and that's certainly the way it should be. Actually, now that I think about it, I remember warning my friends who could tan that they would someday have wrinkles and may get skin cancer, but I only said that because I was jealous.

I guess if we would have thought about it - which certainly would have been a waste of our young time - we would have realized that we would all be faced with some rotten stuff in our lives. I'm glad we didn't think about it then. Ignorance truly is bliss sometimes. We were so busy enjoying the sun and the bright blue skies that we had no idea in the world that a pewter sky day with fog and mist is also beautiful in its time.

Even though the stuffed-shirts don't read my blog, I really do love my girls.