Inverse Paranoia

I tried to dissuade her but she insisted. Ferne wanted her 8th birthday party in a forest. She wanted to go on a hike and explore. She wanted to catch frogs and find new trails. “But what if it rains?” I said. “There are no washrooms in the forest,” I said. “What are we going to do with 20 kids in a forest for 2 hours?” I thought to myself. I tried to lure her into another option – I took her to the Klim Art School and the cooking facility above our local grocery store, both of which host very cool birthday parties. She was unyielding. She wanted it in a forest. So we went to check out Mill Pond, where we found the neighborhood ‘forest’. We discovered that there was a playground in the area and a small gazebo that would be a perfect location for her birthday party. She was doing a great job convincing me, and the washroom in the vicinity clinched the deal.

So we made plans. We called all her friends and invited them. “You’re having the party where?” was the typical reaction. We ordered the Messy Hands Bus to come to the area to and do arts and crafts on the bus (it was my ‘what if it rains?’ contingency plan). We called Pizza Pizza and ordered 6 extra large pizzas to be delivered at Mill Pond. We baked a fancy cake, got loot bags, and enough junk food to feed an army. We were ready.

Except for one minor thing…what if the gazebo was being used by other people? It was a public park after all, reserving the space was not a possibility, and the likelihood that another family would be using it on a beautiful summer day on a Sunday afternoon was pretty high. I chose to ignore that possibility and decided that we would arrive and the gazebo would be waiting for us without a fuss. I imagined the party in the gazebo and that was that. I could literally visualize the event in the gazebo. (Admittedly, I brought a table cloth to put on the ground just incase my plan didn’t work and we needed to find a location on the forest ground nearby.)

So here’s what happened: we arrived at Mill Pond and the gazebo was waiting for us. No fuss. We set up a couple of picnic tables, and had the party in the gazebo. The guests were amazed. “How did you think of this place?” they asked. “Did you have to reserve the gazebo?” “Weren’t you afraid that someone else might be here when you arrived?”

“No,” I said. “I have inverse paranoia.”

“What’s that?”

“I believe the universe works in my favor.”

They looked at me with a blend of marvel and incredulousness. But indeed the universe worked in my favor that day!

By the way, when I checked the weather that Sunday morning, it was forecasted to rain in the afternoon, but even the rain cooperated and waited until the party was over before it decided to come by for a visit.