Surprises are exciting. One year when my children were young a friend gave me a surprise birthday party. There was absolutely no hint of what she planned and when I walked into her house that day I was stunned when a group of friends yelled "surprise." I was a bit embarrassed but very touched. What a sweet and thoughtful thing to do.

As I was growing up I liked to go to parties and I enjoyed giving them and inviting my friends. I made crepe paper hats and decorated the place with streamers. It was fun to plan and prepare refreshments, games and prizes.

But probably the biggest surprise party I ever had was the summer I went to live on the farm with my sister and brother-in-law in Iowa. It was August and I was going to be a junior in Hedrick High School that year of 1948. The first girl I met was Marie, a neighbor girl. She was a senior in High School, a year older than me.

One day I decided it would be fun to have a get acquainted party. My sister, Lois agreed and we started planning. We would get the names of the girls in my class from Marie.

But Marie advised me to wait until after school started. "Things are different in the country than they are in town," she warned. "People get busy."

But I didn't see how things could be much different; after all, didn't all girls like parties? I just didn't feel like taking Marie's advice, I wanted to get acquainted with my new schoolmates right away. I couldn't wait. So Marie gave me the names. I think there were nine or ten girls who would be in the junior class.

I sent out invitations and Lois and I planned the party. First we cleaned the big two-story house from top to bottom. We even washed the windows. Crepe paper streamers were hung up and we planned refreshments. Ray milked several cows and there was plenty of rich cream. Now I've always loved desserts and my sister made a heavenly graham cracker, date, nut roll with whipped cream on the top that was delicious. I asked her to fix that.

The big day arrived and everything was ready. The house was shining clean, games and prizes were ready to go and the yummy dessert was in the refrigerator waiting for the girls, who would soon be my friends, to come to the party.

The party was set for 2:00 o'clock in the afternoon. Marie had something she had to do first so she would be a little late. Well, 2:00 p.m. rolled around; the front walk was empty. Maybe they were a little late. But the clock kept turning and no one came to the door. I anxiously watched the road but it was strangely empty. The longer we waited the more I started to realize that Marie had been right. I should have listened to her. Finally I had to admit that no one was coming to my party.

I called Marie and told her no one showed up. She was sympathetic and kind enough to refrain from saying "I told you so."

We had a clean house and lots of graham cracker date roll to eat. That was one of those times I wished I had listened to what a friend told me.

I'm glad to say that later I got acquainted with the girls from my class. Every one of them had been busy that summertime day and had a reason for not coming to my party. They were very nice and when school started we were good friends.

It wasn't supposed to be but that turned out to be a surprise party. It certainly was a surprise to me.