Anatomy of how to shock the hell out of your closest, dearest friend:
read more ↓Step one: Tell her you’re spending your Christmas holiday in Hawaii.
Step two: Call her husband and set up nefarious plans, swearing him to secrecy.
Step three: Don’t go to Hawaii, go to the deep, dark, cold depths of the mountains in British Columbia – specifically, Kelowna.
Step four: When she catches you online on messenger, tell her how you’re indoors in the middle of the day because it’s raining cats and dogs.
Step five: Thank your lucky stars that it’s rainy season in Hawaii, ensuring that your story sounds reasonable.
Step six: Go back to Vancouver and ask your surrogate mom to drive you to your closest, dearest friend’s home.
Step seven: Walk up to her door and get bombarded with a hug and shrieks of, “Fuck you, you lying motherfucker, I love you!”
Though I was overcome with her eloquence, surprising the hell out of Shar was probably one of the hardest secrets I’ve been able to keep. I’ve known since October that I was going to spend the holidays in Kelowna and Vancouver. I haven’t seen Shar since May 2006, I haven’t been to Vancouver since the year 2000. So for nearly three months I’ve had to keep my mouth shut in order to pull off the surprise. It was well worth it.
Of course, her husband Brian almost immediately had a look on his face like, “What have I done?!?” This happened after the three of us went for lunch and Shar and I started discussing the Madonna movie-thon we’re going to partake in to heal our assumed New Year’s Day hangovers. It only got worse when, after wandering in and out of stores in her neighborhood, we put together a tray of rye crackers and goat cheeses, started pouring wine, and began to watch the Buffy and Spike love affair from beginning to end, fast forwarding through all the non-essential speaking parts. Brian made it to 7pm before he announced, “I’m going to the pub to watch the game.”
The side effect to sitting on such a secret for so long? Lack of sleep. I awoke yesterday morning – which was the date of execution for the plan – at about 4:30am. I forced myself to sleep for another hour before I finally gave in to my excitement and got out of bed. So just when we were getting to the non-Buffy and Spike parts, focusing on Willow’s evil plan to ruin the world? I fell asleep. Then again, it could be because there was no more pseudo vampire porn on TV, but I’m going to go with the former explanation to save myself a little dignity.
At any rate, I’m currently sitting in Shar’s bed with her reading over my shoulder as I type this, her adorable diva dog Casey laying at our feet, and we’re contemplating where we’re going to shop today. Can you feel the estrogen surging through the room? (Brian can, which is probably why he left at 6am this morning.)
More later. But in short: Best. Christmas. Ever.
↑ close
