The dark.
An unsuspecting victim.
A gang of people yelling.
A surprised face.
Faces laughing and cheering.
A husband validated.
The surprise over.
A husband relieved…

This is the dissection of an 80’s Party

I’m the kind of person that loves surprises. I’m also the kind of person that makes it very difficult to pull off a surprise. I ask too many questions and organize every last detail and catch every double story so if you could pull off a double surprise – all the power to you.

When I climbed the steps to the rooftop, I knew there were people up there. I thought the 5 or 6 people we were going out with that night were waiting to toast my birthday and then we’d be on our way. I wasn’t, however, expecting a PARTY of people. And then I began to take it in. I looked around to see faces of people that had regrettably told me they couldn’t make it out that night. Faces of people that texted me convincing stories of previous engagements they had made that would bar them from coming out to celebrate my birthday. And then I stopped looking at their faces and noticed their outfits. What were they wearing? Some guys were wearing full on mullet wigs. One grew a mustache and donned intense silver aviators and a ripped sleeved GATORS shirt.

A sea of neon exploded in my eyes like fireworks in a night sky. Side ponytails? Who wears side ponytails anymore? I haven’t seen a side ponytail and scrunchies since… and just when I began to understand that this was no ordinary surprise party, DJ AmazingLee started the music. The familiar boppy entrance of Cyndi Lauper’s anthem, the original girls’ night out song, “Girls Just Want to Have Fun.” And then I understood.

I can only imagine how excited Husband was to get me to that rooftop, to get me to the surprise so that he didn’t have to hold on to it anymore. He is a self-described surprise blower. I can’t think of how many times he’s started a sentence with, “I wanted this to be a surprise but…” Great, babe. Surprise blown!

I had already planned a wine night and a joint birthday party for this year’s festivities so poor Husband had to recruit help from 98% of our friends to lie, cover, and turn down plans in order to keep this surprise thing going. And they did. They even double-checked each other’s cover stories before returning texts to me just to make sure they weren’t blowing the surprise to smithereens.

One friend told me he was going to Miami – MIAMI! Another friend, Laughlin, had planned a “fake” party for the following weekend so that between Beckett’s going away and this “fake” party, I would have to hold off all plans until the end of JENuary. And the jig was almost up when I sent Laughlin a text message from Husband’s phone. I wasn’t trying to catch him in something I was just trying to get details so I could plan my own party and since Husband was driving he gave me his phone to text Laughlin. Pretending to be Husband I texted Laughlin about the date for this “fake” party. Upon receiving the message, Laughlin got nervous wondering Why is he sending me a message about the fake party? He knows there’s no party. Poor Laughlin was terrified he would answer wrong so he showed the message to his wife, Sara, to ask her opinion of what to write back so that he wouldn’t slip up. Luckily, Husband had by that point snatched back his phone.

Since the party was an 80’s theme, Husband thought about how he would get clothes there for me. His answer came from our pregnant friend, Tami who suggested asking the other girls to bring stuff. “They’ll love it,” she told him. She was right.