I'm the Booger

As Colin Mochrie so eloquently stated once, "You've got a booger!" Mom, you have got a booger, and that booger is me.

Evie woke up at 5:00 this morning, coughing and wheezing and whimpering. After giving her a drink and some medicine, I went back to bed. I couldn't sleep, though. I found my mind drifting to years past, and recalling memories that had all but disappeared from my mind.

I'm a lot like my mom. I love surprises, but I'm rarely surprised. Somehow, I always find out about things before I'm supposed to.

When I turned 18, my family decided to throw me a surprise party. I was heading off to college in a month or two, and I'm sure they wanted to have a fun celebration with me while they still could. Or something.

At the time, I was dating a few guys, I had a job, and I was keeping pretty busy. I happened to be home, however, when my friend Amber's mom called to RSVP for my party. In fact, I'm the one who answered the phone. I had no idea what she was talking about, of course, but I figured it out pretty quickly. I didn't want to ruin it for my family, though, so I pretended that I didn't know about the party.

The trouble was, one of the guys I was dating kept asking me if he could take me out on a date for my birthday. I kept telling him "no." I didn't want to screw things up for my family! Finally I just told him about the surprise party, so he would know why I couldn't go out with him. That's when he admitted to me that it was his job to get me out of the house and to the party.

Oops.

One thing led to another, and, while I got to the party just like planned, everyone found out that I hadn't been surprised. I felt bad about it... But that wasn't the last time I ruined a surprise party for myself.

A few years later, I was home from college for the summer. I was working at a hair salon as a receptionist. When I came home from work on my birthday, I noticed extra cars parked around the house and people moving around inside. I was tired, cranky, and all my closest friends were still at college so I didn't anticipate that there would be all that many people I'd really want to see at my party.

So, what did I do?

I snuck around the back of the house, unlocked the utility room door by sticking my arm through the dog door, and hid downstairs in the family room. I didn't let anyone know I was home, I just sat there and listened to the people chatting upstairs. I felt a little guilty, but I found the entire thing highly funny as well.

Eventually my family spotted my car outside. Lyssa came downstairs and told me to stop being a jerk and go upstairs. Then she told me that someone had come out from Utah to surprise me.

That stopped me short. Who on earth could it be? I ran upstairs and found my ex-boyfriend (who was also one of my close friends) in the kitchen, doing the dishes. I was so excited! And I felt like a complete moron for ruining the surprise. Again.

To this day, I still complain about not getting surprise parties. There's nothing more exciting than finding out that people went through a lot of trouble to celebrate how much they love you.

Honestly, though, I shouldn't complain. It's no one's fault but my own.

I'm such a booger.