Well, There's A Surprise!

I've not added anything to the diary for a while. This is because I'm hopeless at keeping secrets and one particular secret has been dominating my every waking moment. You see, my dear old Ma celebrated a big birthday recently and I decided a while back that she deserved a surprise party. Then suddenly it was February and everything became a little fraught.

I hate driving. Actually that's a lie, I drive perfectly happily around the South West all the time; what I hate is driving long distances on the motorway with Tiddler trying to escape from his seatbelt, arguing with Himself about whether to avoid Birmingham (I recommend it at all costs) and what the speed limit is, and hours and hours spent playing a game I like to call "What's That Smell?!" (anyone with a toddler will sympathise). Before this particular trip I'd been sleeping badly and suffering one very specific and recurring nighmare about a little silver Corsa being crushed by a lorry on the M5. That would be my little silver Corsa, then. With my husband and baby inside. So for me the whole idea of the party was somehow tainted with a vision of impending doom. And the worst part was that I couldn't tell the very person I would normally confide in because she knew nothing of the whole event.  

Heaven knows how she didn't guess. My father and I are not good liars, and neither do we speak to each other very often, so we couldn't remember who was supposed to know what and whether we should mention that we had phoned each other. Thank God for mobile phones, that's all I can say.

I will admit to a cynical streak in my nature. In fact, I am a doom merchant pure and simple: I expected to crash on the M5 in spectacular fashion, I expected the hotel to ban people wearing kilts (that really would have been a problem)  or for everyone to decide not to come after all, or for the hotel to be picked up by a tornado, Wizard-Of-Oz-style and end up in Birmingham(!)

But nothing went wrong. They arrived (my father called from the downstairs loo at home to advise of their imminent departure, as planned) at the prescribed time. We sang Happy Birthday. My mother looked beautiful and surprised and serene all at once, and there were speeches from all 5 of her siblings, who each told a tale from their childhood about how my mother was helplessly accident-prone and was frequently  rendered incapable by attacks of the giggles (she still is, as am I. We do a good line in inappropriate chortling in my family) and there was a touching speech and a brilliant poem from my father (who had admitted to  being worried about the public speaking part for some weeks, during our many clandestine conversations).

So, if you hadn't guessed, the surprise party certainly threw up a few surprises for me, not least how smoothly it went, how very happy I was to see each and every guest who came and how very proud of my parents I am.  

Fiona. 3rd March 2007

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