The Ice Cream Man Cometh

When I was a child, I used to love hearing the ringing of the ice cream man's truck singing it's song down the street. It could be the next street over or on my street one block away. But when I heard that jingle from that beloved truck......"I walked around the corner and I walked around the block and I walked right in to a donut shop....and I picked up a donut and I licked off the grease and I handed the lady a five cent piece.....Weeeellllllll she looked at the nickle and she looked at me and she said this nickle is no good to me, there's a hole in the middle I can see right through....say I, there's a hole in the donut too!"...I knew there was ice cream in my immediate future. It was an expectation of delight.

I can even remember one day when a couple of friends and myself heard that glorious tune from afar but alas, there was no parent with the fruits of our desire in sight(I mean there was basically no one with any cash to pay for our bounty). I secretly reached into my mother's purse and eureka! A fresh five dollar bill!

You must realize back in the days of my youth, five dollars bought a plethora of ice cream from Mr. Good Humor. My friends and I spent every last penny. We took our treasure inside of the garage of one and ate until each and everyone us almost puked. It was glorious. I was the king. I saved the day. I was the saviour of our Good Humor-ous-ness!

Until I returned home.

I'm not sure how old I was. But let's say I was 7 or 8(at the most). I had no idea how important every single dollar in my mother's wallet was to her. Quite frankly when I took the fiver out of her purse I was sure she would never miss it. There was a bunch of other dollars in there(of course they were probably all ones). The thought I would get caught while I sucked and licked each chocolate eclair to my heart's desire never even crossed my mind. As a matter of fact, when I walked home that evening(after the Serritella whistle), I was as proud as a peacock. Whoops!

When I walked into the buzzsaw that was my father with chocolate around my lips....well let's just say, I never....EVER....took money out of my mother's purse again! I do it to my wife now and again, but sometimes when I slide the bills out of her wallet, I can still feel the sting in my ass from that first time.

After that experience, the ice cream man didn't have all those happy feelings any longer. In fact it was years and years after when I came across this jovial, ice cream spewing, trouble making man again.

I was at my brother-in-law's house. We were playing with his children in the yard. They were about 5 and 8 years old(they're 16 and 13 now and will probably kill me for telling this story). It was a warm sunny day. Everything was cheery and happy until we heard that dreaded jingle(see above. I'm not writing it again).

I saw rage in my brother-in-law's eyes. He turned up the radio in the yard. He started the lawnmower. He started his car and revved the engine. It occurred to me he was trying to make as much noise as possible.

I asked him, "What the hell are you doing?"

He said, "It's that man. He's not gonna beat me this time."

I realized it was the ice cream man and he was trying to drown out the jingle with as much noise in the yard that he could manufacture. I was extremely confused. Why could someone not like the ice cream man?

He explained to me that once you buy ice cream from the ice cream man he now knows where you live. He knows that your kids will beg you to no end until you give in and buy them ice cream from this guy. He knows it, and exploits it. Being the competitive guy he is, my brother-in-law began to make it a quest to best the ice cream man.

I shrugged it off and considering this was almost 10 years before my children were born, I just didn't get it.

Now I do.

I'm telling you this ice cream truck guy knows my kids are listening every minute of every day for his stupid jingle to come down our street and you know we're a staple of his route. He's counting my money before he even pulls onto our block. S.O.B. I hate this guy!

My stupid kids make me buy for everyone on the block too! They always say, "Daddy, what's the number rule?"

I reply, "Share." Then I think to myself why the hell did I teach them that as I dole out the money to this prick in the jingle playing, stupid colored, odd shaped truck? And you know what? Five bucks doesn't even cover my two kid's Spounge Bob Square Pants crappy-ass popcicles. Heck, four of us almost all puked our guts out over five bucks worth of ice cream in my day! Now that I'm paying for it, it's drying me out.

Let me just say....It is On! It's me against him now. We're talking loud music, vacuum cleaners and motor boats. Anything I can use to make a ton of noise to keep my kids from hearing the donut song is my friend!

My brother-in-law warned me. I should have listened to him. But then again there was so much noise happening, who could hear him! Thanks for trying Zack.