The other night my husband, Jon, and I went for an ice cream drive. We used to do this with my two sons, heading to an old ice cream stand on the north side of town (one in fact that my parents took me to when I was a kid). The most important part of this late summer ritual was that we would all be barefoot and dressed in pajamas, except for Jon who had the job of going to the walk up window to place our order. Because he had to make a public appearance, he had to be fully clothed. There was something about it...driving down the street late at night with all the windows down, a quick dash for ice cream then home to bed...the best. The stand (pictured above) is now closed, but I have high hopes that some day it will reopen. In the meantime, there are plenty of other stands to frequent.

My sons are older now and less likely to travel in the car with us for ice cream and certainly not in their pajamas. So it was just me and Jon the other night. We chose to ride in the convertible. Not just any convertible, but Jon's restored 1968 Datsun Fair Lady 2000. It's a silver two seater car. Low to the ground, small enough to be almost a go cart. It's loud and fast, and when I'm riding in it, I feel like I'm in a small old style speedboat. The roads are ribbons of flat water and we are buzzing through the city leaving everything in our wake. I know it's an optical illusion. Because we are so low to the ground...it feels like we are going much faster than we are. But I like the sensation a lot.

When we got to the ice cream place which was brightly lit, we found the place crowded with people who were standing in clusters around the parking lot. Some were sitting in their cars or on their cars. We pulled in, got out, placed our order. (I got something with vanilla custard, melted chocolate and stawberries.) When we walked back to the Fair Lady, I noticed that in the car next to us was an older white-haired woman. I couldn't see much of her but I could see her hair which had been recently done up in a very firm bee hive. She had backed her largish four door sedan into a space, and sat licking a single vanilla ice cream cone. I watched her watching people and licking her cone. I couldn't tell if she is enjoying herself or not, because she didn't once change her staight-faced expression. Something about her though made me glad she was there, glad she got herself out the door for a summer ice cream cone, even if she was going to be eating it alone. There's something more to say here...something about hoping I'll be able to do same some day if it ever comes down to it, cruise across town for ice cream on a hot summer night, just out of principle, alone or not.