Spring Parties

All I've been hearing about for the last few days has been Meredith Hopkins' blowout birthday party this weekend. It's so big she's not even having it in her already huge house. She's having it at the local community center. Her parents rented the entire building.

She prances about like a queen and her court maids follow her around. And she's spent the whole time passing around invitations for her party. So far, as near as I can tell, she's invited all of her crowd, plus a smattering of 7th and 8th graders. I've heard Bridget O'Shaughnessy (the redhead from the gymnastics team tryouts) got an invitation but not Hilary. Apparently since Hilary pretty much hangs out with Harriet and me she's not considered 'cool' enough. I'm told that a couple neighborhood 5th graders got invites, too. I've also heard Adam Cartwright got an invitation too.

How does she figure out who gets invited to these parties? Has she devised some mysterious lottery system? Is she just picking names out of a hat?

Harriet, our resident spy, has known Meredith since kindergarten, and has despised her for at least as long. She's one of only a few African-American students in our classes (one of the others is Sasha Moore, who's biracial), and throughout the time, she's heard Meredith make a few cutting remarks about blacks to other people but never to her face. The worst she's ever called Harriet, as far as I know, is 'loser' and 'weirdo'. Oh, and there was that one time she referred to Harriet as 'Buckwheat' -- which I found out was from a very old TV show. One thing people might be surprised to know about Meredith -- something Harriet told me -- is that she has a thing for classic movies and TV.

Still, even though I can't stand Meredith, there's a part of me that wants to be at this party. I don't know if it's curiosity or if it's the fact that Adam will more than likely be there, but being left out kinda sucks.

So when she came up to me at recess today, I knew she wasn't going to give me an invitation, but I wanted to know how she chose people that she wanted to attend her party. "Well if it isn't the Dork Squad," she sneered, looking at Kristy, Hilary, Harriet and me.

"If you ask me," Kristy shot back, "the only dork I see here is you."

"Did you get that out of your dad's closet?" Meredith asked, looking at Kristy's overalls.

"Actually," I said, "overalls are a classic style. They never seem outdated."

"You know, I would have invited you to my birthday party at the rec center," she said, "but I don't allow four-eyed dorks in the building. Sorry." With that she left.

"Who would want to go to her stupid party?" asked Kristy, who was probably within earshot of Meredith. But one thing I respect about her is that she just doesn't care. She has more important things to worry about than whether or not she's invited to a party.

Then I came up with an idea. "Let's have our own party," I said. "We don't need her to have a good time." Hilary and Harriet agreed it was a great idea, but I'm not too sure how I could pull it off. And who would I invite? I knew the three of them would get invitations, and probably Katarina, but anybody else? And what could I do? I came to a shocking decision. I decided to put our plan to isolate Meredith into action. I dropped invites on Marisa's, Natasha's, and Sasha's desks. They don't have to accept but at least they're out there. And I gave Mia her invitation during sixth period. The only thing saving me, I think, is the fact that we've got a week off now for Easter break. I've never hosted a party. Harriet had a slumber party a couple weeks ago, but that was planned for months and months and finally got done. How am I going to come up with something at the spur of the moment? There's also the question of what I'm going to wear. There is the Silver Belle dress I wore to the open house, but that seems much too formal for a regular house party. If any of you bloggers have any excellent party ideas I'm all ears (or should I say, all eyes, as I've got four of them)!