Dad loved convertibles.
And ice cream.
But who could blame him?
The thought of Baskin-Robbins’ thirty-one flavors made me giddy.
How many summer nights did I listen for to him call, “Who wants ice cream?”
And when he did…
I was the first to the car, just behind Dad (who was secretly more excited than anyone). I'd quickly take possession of the coveted front seat when Mom chose a quiet hour alone over a waffle cone - which was most often.
While waiting for the others, Dad would push a button on the dashboard and I'd follow the fabric wall of black as it rolled behind me and out of sight, revealing the slowly fading daylight and cloudless, summer sky.
With everyone finally on board, off we’d go, down Shoreacres Road, as the last of the day’s golfers drifted down the final, shadowed fairway, toward the old clubhouse at the edge of the lake.
As we rolled along at country club speed, I’d look to the trees, heavy with green and I’d suck in the waning day and the humid, cool lake air, until we moved away from the lake and the air became the strong, sweet aroma of fresh cut grass and wild, roadside onions.
Once on Sheridan Road, Dad pressed on the gas pedal and summer was soon whizzing past, behind a veil of windblown hair, which I continuously plucked from my inescapable grin.
It was a straight shot to Lake Forest from here.
Twenty minutes to ice cream, to the Baskin-Robbins in an old, brick building which stood at the corner of Deerpath Road and Bank Lane, just past the theatre where standing in line with Chris and her boyfriend, Rick, (to see a movie I can’t remember and likely shouldn’t have been seeing) I caught a brief glimpse of a naked man - a streaker - running past the crowd, before Chris cupped her hands over my eyes and Rick laughed louder than anyone.
Brightly illuminated by the two big windows on either side of its corner door, I'd look for the ice cream shop as soon as we turned onto Deerpath to see if there were a lot of people in line making their own difficult flavor decisions.
I liked it when it was crowded.
It gave me more time to stroll up and down the glass-walled freezer cabinets, inspecting gallon after gallon of colorful, ice-cold goodness.
Bubble Gum was an early favorite, until what I first saw as the added benefit of something left to chew when the ice cream was gone, turned out to be consistently flavorless morsels of rubber.
Hardly worth missing out on something chocolaty.
Rocky Road was almost irresistible, but often greedy for more, I’d order the Banana Royale, with its two scoops of vanilla ice cream, hot fudge, chopped nuts, whipped cream and a Maraschino cherry on the very, very top.
I never ate the bright red cherry which stained the peak of the whipped cream pile, but it reminded me of Uncle Louie and his big Oldsmobile, with its massive back window filled with baseball caps and his massive trunk filled with boxes and bottles, including the largest jar of Maraschino cherries I’d ever seen - I've yet to see its equal - which stood unopened in our kitchen cupboard for ages.
I liked thinking about Uncle Louie.
I also liked stuffing myself with Banana Royale.
Dad teased that I must have had a hollow leg, since my stomach couldn’t possibly fit an entire sundae. But somehow I managed.
Everyone had their favorite flavor and everyone's choices were as different as their personalities. Chris loved chocolate chip mint. Jim: butter pecan and pralines n' cream. Mia liked rainbow sherbet, but mostly because it coated her tongue and hardly-seen-a-toothbrush-all-summer teeth, which she liked to stare at it in the side view mirror as we passed beneath the just lit street lamps on our way home. Being the youngest, Mark took his ice cream cues from each of us, but usually ended up with more of the thirty-one flavors running down his chin and tiny hands than in his stomach.
Loath to re-admit offspring with fast melting ice cream into his always pristine car, Dad would lead what he called his "troop" toward Market Square where we'd admire the stores from a drippy distance. Even with a big bowl of ice cream in both hands, I'd peer through the large windows of Marshall Fields and think about how much I'd love to have some Frango Mints, which I could see stacked high atop their very own display table at the entrance of the old department store.
I’d scan the dimmed display cabinets and shiny glass countertops and think about the lady in the first floor makeup department who looked as if she'd been there since the store first opened in 1928.
But it wasn't her age that fascinated me.
She fascinated me.
She always wore black.
Always in a dress, or a skirt and blouse.
That perfectly matched her jet-black bob.
Which was accentuated with a precisely penciled-in, black as pitch, widow's peak.
A steadfast fancy from her flapper days?
Her happy days?
Kitty-corner from the department store's stately, columned and canopied facade, a few hops past the old rec center, we’d look in the windows of Helander’s, the stationary store where I bought my first blank pages and filled them with my first independent words.
Past this was Kiddles, with its floor to ceiling bicycles and basketballs, football helmets, baseball t-shirts and everything in between. Where Mom and Dad made someone's day when they purchased bicycles for all seven of us.
Certain shops around the square enticed me on these lazy, summer nights, while others, even though their faces were familiar and reassuring, intimidated me for having never stepped inside.
Market Square Bakery was not one of those places.
I knew it inside and outside, where the same old, dusty display cakes sat in the same, old dusty display windows for years. Where just through the door, the smell of fresh baked sugary treats hugged you like an aunt and made after-school errands with Mom tolerable.
On these walks around the old, historic square, we’d scan the streets and the grassy center for a friend among the small crowds gathered around the fountain and benches. Rarely was the time when we didn't see somebody we knew relishing the cool of the evening.
The sounds of strangers laughing.
The chirp of the crickets that accompanied the street lamps and the dark.
Their own ice cream treats.
Our house being on the northern edge of familiarity, the nights we wandered around the square with our Baskin-Robbins’ were some of the rarer moments during my childhood when I felt part of the community, the camaraderie.
So I made my Banana Royale last as we crossed Western Avenue to visit the depot, hoping to see a train before we left the platform. I’d savor every moment in every bite as we rounded the square, passing real estate offices where lighted photos of formidable houses made window-shoppers dream… big.
As the last of the ice cream disappeared and eyes began to droop, the Lake Forest Sports Shop (a mecca for North Shore preppies) told me we were almost to the car, but not until we passed The Left Bank, which was never anything to me but Pasquesi’s; where for innumerable years, after long absences and serious cravings for a truly Sloppy Joe or creamy cheese dog, the bell on the door would announce my arrival and looking up from his tiny counter, in the back of his simple, purple sandwich shop, Mr. P. would raise his head and ever greet me as if I was a long lost relative finally returning home, where I belonged.
At Pasquesi’s, I always belonged.
On the quiet ride home, with the sky full of stars and fields full of fireflies, I’d lay back in the back seat (having had to relinquish the front for a sibling demanding their turn), lower myself from the cool, night air, and dream about what flavor I might get next time.
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