For The Birds

As I rode along Royal York Boulevard this cool, crisp pre-autumn morning, my thoughts wandered from this photo (which I'd already planned on posting) to ice cream.

Ice cream.

I love the stuff.

I don't have it so often anymore, but when I do, I wonder why not. I'm trying to eat healthier these days, and I know there are so many "bad" things and "empty calories" in ice cream that it's become a guilty pleasure. Still, when I do have the occasional cone, I delight in the taste, the creamy texture and exquisite, cool feel of it. Is there a more perfect summertime (or anytime) treat?

There are so many flavours nowadays that weren't around when I was a kid; we had none of this "Bear Paw" or "Bubble Gum" or "Orange-Capuccino Delight" or whatever. Boring though it may sound, I think that chocolate is still my all-time favourite flavour. Ahhhh, savouring the sweet simplicity of the extract of the cocoabean...

My folks loved to treat us when we were kids. After church, we'd often walk to St. Aubin's in Ville St. Laurent (a "suburb" of Montreal) for a big pistachio cone (ice cream had to be in cones - none of this "in a cup" business...).

Pilgrimages to Halifax (our grandparents lived there) inevitably brought us to the Public Gardens, walking about, savouring our cones, trying to escape bold pigeons who knew it was their right to extract any foodproducts from park visitors.

Other times it was Point Pleasant Park, Black Rock Beach, sitting on a small stone wall at the edge of the sand, joyfully licking our ice creams that Mom bought us at the small canteen up by the trees. Seagulls watched us with great anticipation, waiting to swoop in for any remnants of our feast.

They moved back to Nova Scotia some twenty five years ago, and I think the thing my Dad delighted in most was the huge, cheap, scrumptious ice cream cones that could be gotten in every village along The South Shore. "For a buck you get the kiddy cone," he enthused on the phone, "and it's twice the size of what you get in Ontario, for a third the price - and it's delicious ice cream, like nothing you've ever had!" - and he was right.

In the ice cream department, it was Dad's job to teach Cat ( a young kitten in those days) and I how to properly lick the cones, especially on a hot summer day. "Keep licking around the bottom of the ice cream, to prevent dripping. You twirl the cone, like this..." Of course, he'd have to give us a demonstration every time; the fact that he had to ingest some of the delicious dribblings was beside the point. "Here, you're dripping again. Give your cone to Dad and I'll clean it up for you." More licking, but we knew he was only doing it for our own good: "Okay, Dad, I think you've got it now. No more drips, you can give it back to me now? You don't have to clean up anymore. I'll take it now. Please? Can I have my cone back?"

In the ice cream department, it was Mom's job to say, as we were nearly done our cone, "Don't eat the last bit of cone. Leave it for the birds. Just throw it down on the ground, it's not littering. They'll find it: leave it For the Birds."

I still do that when I'm eating a cone outside. I bet Cat does to.