Ice Cream

Ice cream.
I love it. I love its smooth creamy texture. I love its cool sensation against my lips and inside my mouth. I love the gentle vanilla flavor that is neither too sweet nor too bland. I love the way it complements all flavors that accompany it.
My love for it started when I was 7 or 8 years old. We lived in a young neighborhood. There were children at almost every home. It stands to reason that an astute business person would set up an ice cream business in our neighborhood.
There was a truck which I believe was called The Softie Ice Cream truck. Like clock work this white cube truck with its pavlovian music idled its way up our neighborhood serving up its cones to the lucky few. My sister and I would run home from school (which happened to be across the street from our home) and divide and conquer our mother for the ten cents it cost for the cone. Although he came around every day we did not get treats everyday.
Mr. Softie stopped coming to the neighborhood. However my addiction to ice cream never stopped. We now had to work on dad to drive us to the local Dairy Queen. The hot summer days in Saskatchewan made this an easy task to accomplish. Some assortment of my siblings, mom, dad, me and our 50 pound white Samoyed dog would hop into the car and head for the closest DQ.
As much as I liked ice cream, Chief, our dog loved it more. Dad or mom would go up to the outdoor window and order each of us a cone. Chief would be hopping from paw to paw waiting for his cone. One of us would hold it for him. I can still see him lick the soft ice cream all the way down to the bottom of the cone. When the last drop of ice cream was gone, he would eat the cone. It caused a stir outside of our car as people watched amazed that the dog would get his own cone.
Even now ice cream holds me in its trance. I have been known to sureptiosly drive through McDonalds for their ice cream cone that I have enjoyed before ever arriving home to the family. This spring, the Dairy Queen began an advertisement campaign on TV for its newest treat, the waffle cone sundae. It was marketed just for me and it worked as I knew I had to try it at least once this summer. And I did.
A few weeks ago on a very hot and sultry Sunday afternoon, while driving around in our air conditioned car to cool down, we approached a Dairy Queen. Bill knows my love for ice cream and every once in a while will stop without announcing his attention. Give me ice cream and my heart is yours. Without the need to ask, he bought us the waffle ice cream sundaes. We drove to the shadiest tree and shamelessly left our car running while we attacked our ice cream treats. Folks, it was heaven. It was poetic. It was indescribable.
Later in the week while I was shopping with my sister, her daughter and granddaughter, I asked them if they had tried the waffle sundaes. They hadn’t. We were waiting for an elevator to take us to the carport. The only other person was this elderly white haired woman. She wore wonderfully bright pressed clothes. Her matching white purse was clutched next to her body. She was staring at the numbers waiting for her elevator. In the meantime, I started to describe the chocolate, caramel, strawberry waffle sundae.
The bowl is made of a light freshly baked waffle which has the thinnest layer of a glistening chocolate coating. In the bowl they carefully add the soft mound of cool creamy white ice cream. They slowly pour the sweet caramel and strawberry sauce filling in the space between the ice cream and the bowl. They pour the thick chocolate hard sauce over the ice cream and for the sheer cheekiness of it; they add three dollops of whipped cream.
I explained with great flare to my sister and niece that it was love at first taste. It was a little piece of heaven sitting there just begging to be eaten with purpose and enjoyment. It sent me to another plane of existence. After the first few spoonfuls, I told Bill not to talk to me until I was done and when I finished, I was all his for whatever he wanted.
I explained that as each spoonful was a little taste of ecstasy. I felt that if I could have I would have been that cartoon character called Precious Pup who when he was given his treat would hug himself and moan in happiness as he floated skyward. I was reliving the waffle sundae as I explained it to them.
In the mean time the elevator came but was going down when we wanted up. The elderly lady got on and then quickly came off. She realized almost too late that it was not the direction she needed. When she got off the elevator she came over to me. “Excuse me, but I was wondering where you got this wonderful dessert?”
I felt this faint smile cross my face and told her, the Dairy Queen.
I will never know if this sweet lady ever bought this wonderful ice cream treat. I will never know if she felt the same about it as I did. I only felt that I had just played out the classic scene in the movie “When Harry Meets Sally”, when the lady at the next table to Harry and Sally said to the waitress that she would like to have what Sally was having.
Summer is too short; go out and enjoy ice cream.
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