The other side of the counter

No matter how full my own freezer is of ice cream cartons, I still seem to find room in my stomach to crave the ice cream from my place of work. Consequently, I find guiltily myself on the other side of the counter whenever the craving becomes unquenchable. 

I’d been planning it all weekend. Sheepishly, I ordered a small with half spiderman (it seems ever since that child dropped his spiderman ice cream on the carpet, I’ve had sympathy for the flavour) and half vanilla from my coworker at the shop. She smirked and grabbed the scoop, constructing a cone with as much finesse as I would have hoped. 

Outside, my family and I grabbed a bench to enjoy the day and ice cream. Little did I consider, the day was hot enough to warrant a sleepy atmosphere around the town. We were the only ones outside. I appreciated the privacy as it allowed me to shamelessly enjoy my cone, licking it into shapes of beauty. My favourite design involved making the top of the cone twisted and pointed to the sky. In time, I managed to blend together the vanilla and the spiderman to create a lovely purple. 

Before I was able to put much thought into the design of the cone, however, I realized how much I must speed up the process. Before my eyes and under my tongue, it was being liquefied, threatening to spill over the bottom. Panicked, I grabbed at the drops of melted ice cream to prevent them meeting my khaki pants. In the last moments of desperation, I leaned into the picnic table and watched, horrified as the cone met its doom and a stream of melted ice flowed down my fingers and to the table.

I’m not usually a messy eater and so did not see the need to kill trees and take napkins from the counter inside. Due to this error in judgement, I could only stare at the blob of purple on the table. The cone in my hand continued to melt and I continued to fret. 

The customers I’d always sigh and roll my eyes at when I was forced to clean up their sticky, dried messes appeared to be a lot like myself. There is nothing to prevent the cold quality of an ice cream cone from the threatening heat of a May long weekend. I stand corrected and must proclaim my apologies. I guess the ice cream is always more manageable from the other side of the counter.