It's gettin', it's gettin', it's getting kinds hectic...oops, sorry. No, this post is not an ode to the nineties group Snap and their power dance hit that was played more than once on my bright yellow, 20 pound, cassette Walkman, during college workouts. This post is to declare my conquering one of childhood's greatest disappointments, the missing of the ice cream man. "Oh no you di-in't!", you say. Oh, yes, yes I did.
Going to back to last week, at seven o'clock, on yet another night Hubby had called to say he was going to be late, I was struggling to hang on to the end of my rope, in the middle of Little Man's bath, when the girls start shreiking in the living room. Thinking one of them was one fire, I ran in with thirty-five pounds of wet baby in my arms, finally able to hear the words they were sceaming, "THE ICE CREAM MAN!!! HE'S COMING!!!!" Unable to grab the change jar and dry and dress the wet baby simultaneously, said purveyor of overpriced, cartoon-themed dairy products sped on by at approxiamtely fifty miles an hour, as my daughters let out cries of protest I think could be heard from space. (Cue my cursing the confines of my reality and screaming in my head, as I do on a regualr basis, "I AM NOT SUPPOSED TO BE DOING THIS ALONE!!!!"). How in God's name am I supposed to catch this icy, speed demon?
Fast forward to Saturday night, the kids are in bed, H and I are sitting on the front steps having a drink, pretending we're on the porch of the new house, when my pink and white striped, "Do You Know the Muffin Man"-playing nemesis rounds the corner and I catapult myself off the steps. He and I are going to have words. H bought some token ice cream to soften the verbal assault he was sure I was about to deliver, but seeing the tiny, little Indian man who was resposible for so much of my evening misery, I lost my steam. So I nicely said to him, "Buddy, you gotta do me a favor. Slow down. I got three kids in there and I'm usually alone. I can't take the crying." To which her replied, "You break my heart! Here take this." And that's when he did it.
He handed me a card with HIS CELL PHONE NUMBER ON IT and told me to call him if he ever passes me by when I need him.
Can you imagine? Yet another use of modern technology that my kids will benefit from and never know the difference. The ice cream man didn't have a cell phone back in my day. I'm not even sure he had a valid driver's license. I'm excited about that fact that I will never agian, or at least until we move, have to hear the ear-splitting screams of a child denied an ice-milk, Dora the Explorer pop, but at the same time perhaps this is one of those important life lessons that teaches them to deal with disappointment.
In any case, I made, what I now realize is, a huge mistake, and told the kids about the card. Never mind worrying about my children not learning to deal with disappointment, the first weeknight after my little talk with Ragi, my oldest turns to me after dinner and asks, "Can you call the ice cream man now." I have created a monster.*
*And no, I didn't call him.
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