The Ice Cream Man
A great childhood memory for me was the one day in the week (usually a Sunday) when the ice cream man would visit our part of town. It was generally around 3pm that he would arrive and I would look out of the window waiting to catch a glimpse of the ice cream truck coming down the street. Usually, however, it was the wonderful, happy jingle that the truck played that I would hear first. It was so loud you could hear it several streets away! I would go out and join the queue of eager faces awaiting their turn for the treat of the week. Clutching my valued pocket money in my hand I would make my mind up quickly as to what I was going to ask for. Usually it was a '99' vanilla ice cream cone with a chocolate flake but sometimes I would go for a straight vanilla cone dipped in sprinkles and smothered in strawberry sauce. Delicious!
It's wonderful that even today, despite all the convenience stores and exotic, attractively packaged commercial ice cream products on the market, the ice cream man and the ice cream truck is still 'alive and kicking'. Maybe there aren't as many of them as there used to be but at least where I live the children get to hear that wonderful, old fashioned, loud and almost distorted happy jingle once a week and get the chance to queue up for ice cream. Perhaps the waiting and anticipation is a key part of this great, traditional ice cream experience - you just don't get that when you buy a tub of Ben & Jerry's or Häagen-Daz at your local store!
Long live the ice cream man and his ice cream truck