ice cream

You know how sometimes a smell or feeling can trigger a memory?  That happened tonight.

Kyle and I took an easy after dinner stroll with the girls.  This is something we love doing in the summer time when the sky is light for long enough.  Sure, they go to bed a little later...but it's summer.  The girls love it.

So we were on our walk and decided to go for ice cream.  Carpe Diem and all that.  There are two ice cream places by us.  One is a frozen yogurt bar where you do your own toppings and such...we go there most often.  The other is the Boston standard JP Licks.  It is also very good.

We went to JP Licks tonight, stood in line, sampled a few of the new flavors.  Kyle got his hodgepodged mix of mint-oreo and strawberry, E got chocolate, Abby got chocolate chip cookie, and I settled on Butter Almond.  Kyle hates ice cream with nuts in it and I'm the opposite.  I always go for pistachio and maple walnut mixed. But tonight - butter almond.

JP Licks is tiny, and it was a nice evening, so we went outside.  The girls sitting on a bench and Kyle and I were standing.  All eating our treats.

The Butter Almond flavor was akin to Butter Pecan.  The Almonds gave the ice cream a slight grittiness.  The air was ever so slightly warm and humid.  Sun was setting.  And then I caught the wiff of grass.  Maybe slightly damp grass.  Like fresh cut lawn, but more humid.  It was definitely that smell that did it.

I was transported back to Camden, AR.  And Harmony Grove.  And Fordyce.  And Hot Springs. And every other small town that hosted a Sunday evening ice cream social.

I always looked forward to those nights.  But, in hindsight, I certainly took them for granted.

We would go to evening church somewhere, and after the service we would head outside...just before sunset.  The air was heavy and warm, always humid.  The kids would run around and play while the adults finished setting up the tables and people started bringing out the gallons and gallons of home made ice cream that they had been working on, I assume, all day.

There were always several vanillas, a few chocolates that went fast, a strawberry - and the fresh peach ice cream.  The ice creams were gritty with ice and sugar and they melted fast.  Especially in the evening humidity.  Michael and I always tried to walk the fine line between wanting to be first in line, and yet - not wanting to look too eager.  We'd wait with others, swatting mosquitos off our legs and chatting with people we knew, or didn't know....didn't matter.  We'd eventually get our styrofoam bowl, plastic spoon, and pick our flavor.

Sometimes there were tables and chairs, but they went to the older folks.  We sat on the grass, or maybe on a wall, or the church steps.  We always wanted seconds.  Sometimes there was enough left, but not usually.

As dusk fell, we finished our servings, games, and conversations and began to say "see ya next week" to everyone.  Cars pulled out of the gravel parking lot  with their headlights on and down dirt roads making distinct noises of leaving.

And then our family would pack up in our car, we were usually among the last to leave, and head home. Scratching our mosquito bites and rehashing what flavors we'd had and who we'd spoken to.  Good times, indeed.

And then I was back.  Standing on the corner of Beacon St. and Langley with cars beeping, runners jogging by, people out walking their dogs, or just walking - just watching my girls scrape their cups for the last of their treats with rivers of chocolate running down their arms and all over their faces.  Looking happy and sleepy.

It's different here, for sure.  Different, but not bad.

At any rate, I just wanted to share.  The small country church summer evening ice cream social...what a fantastic thing to have experienced and what a nice memory to still have.