Table of Contents
Chapter 1: The Conspiracy Begins
As I write this it is finally Mare’s actual birthday, February 26th, 2025. We — Mare, myself and Brother George — are on various screens drinking morning coffee. There is a relative calm to the day as the workweek for others begins and we wind down from the so-called birthday weekend.
Aside from the soft ideas on what to do this year for those turning age 70, the germ for this event began with a text from Heather Douglas, a former co-worker of Mare’s and continuing friend. She suggested that several other ex-co-workers would like to throw a surprise party or something for Mare. Perhaps 10 gals in a Mexican restaurant, such as similar celebrations have gone. So the conspiracy begins.
Within a very short time — maybe two days or less — I was offered a free “house concert” by the NOIS Saxophone Quartet of Chicago. The Nois Boys, as we affectionately call them, are a very high quality set of young professional musicians. Their normal selections are typically new compositions — modern, not jazz. While I enjoy their music, I have likened it to “listening” to a Jackson Pollack painting. Further discussion about NOIS is for another time, but for now know that they are over-the-top excellent and, more important, a genuine favorite of Mare’s. János Csontos, the baritone sax and native Hungarian, is our main contact and friend. He advised that they could be in the Ann Arbor area to perform for us Friday, February 23rd — close enough to the actual birthday the following Monday to merge into the surprise party plan.
So now I have a house concert, but really no house. At least no house of sufficient size to accommodate an indoor party, much less setting up a concert space. Thus I set about considering an alternate venue.
My first inspired but not-so-great idea was to rent the big A-Frame cottage at our campground, Waldenwoods. A party there was allowed but the rental would cost about $450 per night. Somewhat obvious problems quickly surfaced — starting with just how to get the invitees to the site. It is a gated property a good 30 minutes north of Ann Arbor. Doing this as a surprise on a Friday night was logistically impossible.
My next wishful but essentially just as dumb idea was to try to get the Ark for a few hours. The Ark, if you are not familiar, is one of the nation’s premier performance spaces and would be the best venue to showcase the Boys. I even considered employing the Reizner Family Fund to bribe the Ark board in exchange for a hefty donation. I started tracking down the people needed, but dumped that idea promptly. The Ark already had a booking for February 23rd commencing at 8 p.m. And moving a celebration to a second location effectively kills the party. So that idea failed to go any further.
Chapter 2: The Venue and the Guest List
I reached out to a few people for suggestions. Although Ann Arbor has many venues, most are downtown and posed similar issues to the Ark. I rejected all of downtown without regret. Cousin Carey suggested the Ann Arbor City Club among others, so I contacted Greg, their events manager, and arranged a meeting.
The City Club is a genuinely beautiful expanded mansion on Washtenaw Avenue not far from the University. It has parking for 90, was available on the date, and has several rooms — some large, some home-like and cozy — all of which would be ours for the night. The food offerings were of high-end restaurant quality. I also learned that I would have to become a member ($600) to a club I would likely never visit again, and that the total price tag would likely run upwards of $8,000. I kept this venue in my pocket, but decided that on the way home I would stop off at the Washtenaw Golf Club.
The Washtenaw Golf Club — WGC — formerly known as the Washtenaw Country Club, was founded according to their welcome mat in 1899. The buildings are modern, the course is lovely, and it is located right across Packard Road from my office. Drive time from our house to the WGC is about 90 seconds if the light at Packard is green. Very good for a surprise party.
The door was locked when I arrived — it is January and no golfers — but a grounds person let me in and directed me upstairs to meet Donna Hatch, director of catering and events. I immediately liked Donna and the services and food available, as well as the estimated costs, which appeared to be about less than half that of the City Club. Oh yeah, THIS is the place.
On to the next step and probably the most difficult: creating and managing a guest list. My original plan was to have an open bar and heavy appetizers. However, reviewing the prices offered, it was not a significant cost to upgrade to lighter appetizers, open bar, and a full sit-down dinner. All this pointed to the need for a carefully controlled number of attendees.
Here is where Heather was a real partner. She was able to identify, contact and largely secure which former co-workers could and would attend. As it turned out there was a pleasant mix of co-workers, Temple friends, local friends and former neighbors. Brother George booked his flights immediately.
In an effort to lock in attendance while making clear that an invitation did not have a “Plus-One” option, I created and issued tickets — one to each invitee who confirmed. That ticket said “Admit One.” These were mailed or hand delivered along with an individualized letter and schedule of events. Since I was making admission tickets I decided — why not use them for a raffle? The event was billed as “no gifts,” but why not give gifts to some attendees? I acquired three $50 gift cards to Paesano’s, Mare’s favorite restaurant.
Chapter 3: The Details (or: Bob Goes Overboard)
During my occasional visits to Donna for planning I noted the nice baby grand piano in the lobby. Wouldn’t it be pleasant to have a pianist play lobby music for the arriving attendees? I secured Eza Donner, who among other things is a music director and accompanist for the Gilbert & Sullivan Society. His fee was kinda pricey for 30 minutes — but hey, why not? It would add class while awaiting Mare’s arrival and the big reveal.
I set about making table tent cards with everyone’s name. These were placed in the lobby with the idea that they would be removed before Mare arrived. Since about three or four people did not come, there were a couple still in the lobby. Mare was completely oblivious to them so it really didn’t matter.
We of course needed a birthday banner. I stopped at Arborland’s Office Max and ended up ordering a lovely blue 2×3 foot banner with grommets that read “Happy Birthday MARE, Established 1954.” I didn’t want 70 on it so everyone can just do the math. I also realized that way I could use it year after year. Cost: a mere $32.
Table decorations. After a considerable search of the house I found the tub of Beany Babies stored in the furnace room. Some maybe twenty years ago Mare had an absolute obsession for collecting these — what I call “Pellet Pals” since they contain no beans but are filled with polypropylene pellets. Finally in Madison, Wisconsin we had an on-the-street intervention to force her to stop before she bought even more. None the less we still had a rather large number of brand new toys with tags attached. They became table, podium, wall and pretty much everywhere decorations. I also made a trip to the Party Central store to buy hats and pretty but ultimately flawed noise makers — which ended up making almost no noise at all, but looked good on the tables.
János sent me a two-page list of arrangements across multiple musical styles — classical, modern, and pop. He asked if I had a piece I wanted, so I had him arrange “If I Only Had a Brain” from The Wizard of Oz. That is, as they say, our song.
As a last minute thought I set up a monopod and laptop to record the concert on Zoom. At the very last minute I sent the link to sisters Kath and Deb, and Kath actually attended. After the concert Mare and Kath were able to have a brief chat on the link.
Chapter 4: The Big Reveal
I instructed Mare to please wear her killer art jacket and not to smoke or drink anything before as cocktails would be available. “Reservations” were for 6:00 p.m. sharp and I wouldn’t tell her anything about where other than it was expensive.
Ezra played from 5:40 to 6:10 to cover the arrival of guests. The doors to the ballroom were closed on my texted signal as soon as we were all in the car. The light at Packard was red this time so it took a whole 200 seconds instead of the usual 90 — but still quick enough that Mare’s questions about where we were going could be ignored.
We entered, greeted Ezra who started the fanfare, and the doors opened to a crowd of familiar faces in the darkened room trying to get all the candles on the cake lit. Lights came on, Mare blew out the candles — and then she noticed the saxophones lined up. She said to herself: “Could this be NOIS?” Yep. The bar had opened at 5:30 and now it was 6:05. Mare and Bob need cocktails STAT.
The concert was so nice. The sound was rich and solid with their extraordinary arrangements and exquisite timing and coordination. János had arranged “If I Only Had a Brain” — our song — and the performance was of a quality that may have surprised most of the guests. Of course, not myself, George, and certainly not Mare who loves the group.
Dinner followed and was yummy if I say so. I elected for the “Duet” — a 4oz filet mignon with matching chicken marsala, potato mash and al dente green beans. And the cake. Linda McMillin, an original Michigan co-worker and long-time friend of Mare’s, made a superb carrot cake — and even made me provide a copy of the banner so she could match the frostings. So nice. So yummy.
I announced the raffle with eight minutes to spare before last call. The mystery Panera card went to Michael Haven, who said he could walk to the one in Jackson. Really?
I then asked Mare how she felt about giving away Beany Babies. She greenlighted the idea and I announced open season adoptions. A remarkable number of babies left that night. In particular, Hunter, one of the saxophonists, found the exact Beany Baby he had as a child that had disappeared — apparently at the hand of his father — and was now reunited with a brand new one.
Mare says she had NO CLUE until the doors to the ballroom opened. Success. More important, she genuinely enjoyed seeing old friends.
To cap the weekend we went to the Purple Rose Theatre in Chelsea for Jeff Daniels’ “Diva Royale” — held over by popular demand, 90 minutes of hilarious sold-out theatre. From there we went to the Carlyle Grill for long-pour Manhattans. It was yet another sunny day.
The concert and party over, I came down from a month of mild anxiety. In other words — back to normal.
