Travels in Eire #68

Cailin got to work on her plan. First she needed to find a location for young women to be able to get together, and a purpose for the social meetings. The flat that she lived in had a nice sized parlor on the first floor that was barely ever used. She talked to the owner who lived on the first floor across from the parlor, and asked if she could have some friends over on occasion to visit. She keep the whole idea to herself not knowing if this would work for sure.

Then she started designing a flier to attract young professional women who were looking to connect with other women for social evenings and some charity work. No sense in wasting all this talent on just socializing, and Cailin could see the possibility of tying this in with some of what Darren might be doing.

Cailin started leaving her first set of fliers at a coffee shop down the street from her flat for a meeting that following Thursday after work. She really didn't expect to have many women attend but hoped someone would be there. She chose a Thursday as payday was on Friday and everyone, including herself and Darren, often went to a local pub on Friday.

Cailin didn't want to be serving a lot so she settled on tea and cookies and called the group “Tea and Talk” for lack of any better name. With everything set up in the parlor – she figured she could always make more tea, or bring more cookies from her flat if needed – she waited for 6:00PM to arrive and see if there were any takers.

6:05....6:10.....6:15.....and then there was a knock at the front door.

“Is this the Tea and Talk place?” came the question from a young woman standing at the door.

“Yes, it is,” responded Cailn enthusiastically. “Please come in. My name is Cailin. I'm so glad you decided to come.”

“Wait, you sound American. What kind of group is this? Oh, I'm Aislin.” the girl replied.

“Aislin, yes, I'm Irish American. I'll explain everything once we sit down. I was hoping there would be a few more women here.” Cailin's disappointment was obvious.

“My friend Riley is supposed to be coming too. I don't know what has held her up. Let me give her a call.” Aislin could sense Cailin's disappointment and was trying to help.

After a few minutes there was another knock at the door and Riley joined Cailin and Aislin.

The three of them sat down in the parlor and Cailin explained the reason for the flier. Aislin and Riley were immediately intrigued. They agreed that they would like to enlarge their network of friends as both of them had just moved to Derry for work and didn't know that many people yet. The two girls were so excited to have an American friend also, even though Caiin was Irish now, to them she would always be American. After about an hour they agreed to get together again the following Thursday and see if they each could bring along another friend. They had lots of ideas of other women they worked with who were looking for the same friendship experience.

When Cailin closed the door behind the girls as they left, she smiled. Maybe this would work after all. Now she needed a better plan for the group and a better name. She hoped to have all that done by the following Thursday. She cleaned up the parlor and headed up to her flat as her cell rang. Darren was on his way over. What did she have on hand for dinner? And she laughed out loud.