Musings
an Online Journal of Sorts

By Alyce Wilson

Right outside my hometown in rural Pennsylvania, it started to rain.

All the good radio stations vanished, leaving only country, 70s rock and hair metal. "Roseanna" was playing as I drove into the downtown.

Two doors down from my dad's place was parked a black sports car with NASCAR stickers all over it, license plate: 6 MARK 6.

Welcome home.

I was there for my mom's 60th birthday celebration, which we were going to have at a local park on Sunday afternoon. I arrived Friday night to start getting details sewn down.

Dad and I went out to dinner, to a tavern frequented by local college students. They have some of the healthiest food in town; I ordered scallops. We also rented a DVD: "Shanghai Knights." It was pretty good; not as funny as the first one. What mostly annoyed me was all the deliberately anachronistic rewriting of history, such as them running around with future famous individuals (won't spoil it for you, cause I hate when people do that to me).

But the main task of the day was to call Mom and talk to her about the menu. My sister, Dad and I would be hitting the grocery store the next day, as soon as my sister got in from State College. Even though we'd set out the menu months before, Mom was adding things.

"You have to have hot dogs," she said.

"But we're serving beef burgers, turkey burgers and veggie burgers," I said.

"People will expect hot dogs," she insisted.

I grudgingly added it to the list. But despite the list growing steadily longer, Mom was in a great mood, joking around with me. I had a good feeling about the upcoming festivities.

She joked that she was going to tell everyone that I got the invitation wrong and that it was actually her 50th birthday.

"But why should you get to be 50 when Dad has to be 60?" I asked.

"That's his problem."

I told her this would mean he'd married her when she was underage, but she didn't seem to care.

On Saturday morning, I'd brought plenty of work with me (you do know I'm a Type A personality, right?) to keep me busy while my dad did his rounds and until my sister arrived. She had something to write up a log as part of her requirement for her summer internship.

My sister wanted to see "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen," and Mom wanted us to join her for dinner. So the original plan was my sister would arrive at about 3 p.m., we'd do grocery shopping with Dad, have dinner at Mom's place and catch the 7 p.m. showing of "The League." We expected to be back in time to receive my brother and his wife, who were driving down from Vermont as a surprise for my mom.

Due to a series of mishaps, my sister didn't arrive until 4. This completely threw off the timing. After working through the expanded grocery list of 101 things for the party, there was no way we'd make a 7 p.m. showing. But my brother had a key to Dad's place, and we'd left him a note, so we went to the movies anyway.

We'd already purchased our tickets and were sitting in the movie theater when we started to feel guilty. Dad made me make the call, even though it was his cell phone. As soon as he picked up, my brother asked, "Where are you?" He sounded concerned and tired.

"We're in the movie theater," I said sheepishly. "We'll see you a little later."

Mostly, he was frustrated because there had been no way to reach us. Since his presence was a surprise, he couldn't call us at Mom's. Somehow it hadn't occurred to any of us to leave them one of our cell phone numbers so they could perhaps meet up with us.

We felt so bad that after I hung up my sister called back and explained it was all her fault. She explained what had happened. He said it was okay.

By the time we got back that evening, my brother and his wife were already asleep. My sister and I wanted to read. We tiptoed around them and grabbed our stuff, then spread out a mattress in the room in my dad's office that used to serve as my sister's massage therapy room. I fell asleep over Harry Potter and she over one of three SF books she was finishing. She had them stacked next to the bed and was working her way through each.

We both had bad dreams that night, possibly because we'd been talking about the possibility there were ghosts in Dad's office. At one point, I dreamt that there was a torrential downpour for the party, and that we sat under the rented park pavilion anyway, just so we could tell everyone to go home.

Then my brain must have decided I needed to destress. I dreamt that my sister and I went to a huge spa that featured indoor skiing (on strange wooden conveyor belts) and a large, heated swimming pool.

To be continued...

Tomorrow's installment: Party Perfect.

Copyright 2003 by Alyce Wilson

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