How To Blow A Surprise Party

My sister Becky’s birthday party on Friday turned out pretty well. She was only surprised by one aspect of the event which started as a surprise party. Knowing her penchant for investigation, I quickly came to the conclusion that we shouldn’t try to surprise her with a party, but rather try to surprise her with what happens at the party. However, some members of my family, who shall remain nameless and hereafter be referred to only as “dad” and “brother”, were unable to keep the plans under wraps. My idea was to come up with a way to invite a lot of friends she has not seen in a long time and family members she doesn’t see often to present a sort of “this is your life” theme. She’s turning 40, she should feel good about it. So I sent out e-mails and got back a lot of “I’ll be out of the country” and “I have tests to see what’s wrong with my heart that weekend” excuses. Slackers. (kidding of course.) Well, at least my brother could come. She would love to have him walk around the corner unexpectedly while she’s celebrating with friends. I decided to ask dad to video some of our family members in Michigan and we could play a video of birthday greetings for her. So…dad was supposed to bring something down for Grace and mentions to Becky over the phone that Joel could just bring it when he comes. Okay…that’s blown. I get a call from my uncle John saying they would like to come. Great! That will be a big surprise. I’m getting my house ready for guests, Joel e-mails and asks a few questions. This is when I tell him that John and Amy are coming and also realize that he doesn’t know that she knows he’s coming. I tell him that he doesn’t have to lie to her anymore and he gets a little upset. He e-mails back and cc’s her saying he is upset with dad for blowing it. She reads the e-mail and scrolls down to find that John and Amy are coming. Surprise two blown. Well, we still have the video’s right? Well, sort of dad’s camera wasn’t working right and in the process of editing, Bobby lost most of the footage. We did get to hear a few greetings, but not nearly as many as were originally filmed. Surprise three accepted graciously. The last trick I had up my sleeve almost fell through as well. On Thursday, I started feeling cruddy and on Friday it had escalated to down right BLECH! My intention was to sing a song for Becky that I had written about 5 years ago for her/about her. I had been holding on to it because I wanted to be able to present it to her somehow without just handing her the lyrics and saying…”here, this is for you.” So, with the help of Bobby and our friend Chele’ I put aside my stuffy nose and throbbing head for a little while and cried through a song for her. She liked that part. So, it wasn’t a complete bust. She enjoyed her party without the surprise factor anyway, but I would have liked to have been able to shock her a little.

All of that sounds pretty bitter doesn’t it? After reading over it I can see that. I was going for humor. I’m not mad at “dad” or “brother” just thought it was funny how they revealed the surprises. Please don’t hear me writing with a frown. I am really quite pleased with it all.