It had been more than fifty years
since I had a cone from that Dairy Queen,
so Mom said let’s stop and get one,
the day after we had stuffed ourselves
with food and pastries at her 80th birthday party.
I was already feeling fat.
Mom got a chocolate sundae.
I got a large plain cone,
same as always since that very first one
I had when I was a kid.
I’m not much of an explorer when it comes to ice cream.
We ate in the van
because the Dairy Queen was too small
to have a customer seating area.
We ate in silence.
I don’t know what Mom was thinking,
but I was thinking about
how when I was a kid and had no money,
an ice cream cone was just about the best treat
I could have received,
and how I dreamed of eating ice cream
for breakfast, lunch, and dinner,
and then I felt sad because now I’m an adult
and much, much closer to the end of my days than the beginning,
and how adulthood ruins the joy of dreaming
about eating ice cream all day long because,
as an adult, you know that doing that
would probably kill you,
and suddenly I felt sad for the loss of the feeling
of childhood that everything is possible,
and everything is magical,
and that all of our dreams can come true.
And then I thought, wow,
it’s been such a long time since I’ve had
a Dairy Queen cone, and jeez,
is it ever yummy.
And then I thought maybe I’ll have another one tomorrow.
Then I asked Mom what she was thinking and she said nothing.