Life’s greatest moments are those when you lose yourself in the simple. A lazy summer has me thinking a lot about what makes a moment memorable. I’ve been thinking about an experience I had when my parents came to bring me home from Boston. I spent a long while trying to figure out what was worth showing them in this place I called home. But as I went down the list of amazing experiences I’d had throughout the city I realized that what made each place so special to me was the story of getting there. Whether it was stumbling around MIT far too late at night, a three-hour walk to find somewhere only a few T-stops away or the places you wander into after attending a convention none of these places were memorable for the place but for the journey. So let me tell you about one of my journeys from before Boston, a deceptive story where it’s not the place at the end of the journey that makes this memorable but the journey itself.
So my friend Em travels to Spain on at least every year. Cool fact I learned from going with her once, everything is delicious there. But this story takes place before I learned that lesson.
One night we have Em’s family over for dinner and as the parents are sitting and chatting over coffee Em turns to me with that crazed look she gets in her eyes before we end up on an adventure and said to me, “ I need watermelon ice cream.”
“They make watermelon ice cream?” I asked incredulously.
“In Spain. It’s the best thing I’ve ever tasted and I need some right now.”
“You just got your license why don’t we ask if we can go for a drive.” The look was still there so I knew the chances of us this being more than meets the eye were high but this seemed innocent enough so I asked and when the confirmation came in we were in the car in 30 seconds.
Now my car at the time was a 1993 silver Crown Victoria and this was not a young car but I loved it. That was the Boat. I’ll end up talking about the boat a lot more, trust me.
Anyways, I ramble. So we hopped in the car, turned on Bon Jovi and drove off towards the closest grocery store and the possibilities its freezer section offered.
But alas we were doomed to disappointment. Now the grocery stores in my area don’t skimp on variety but watermelon was not among that variety. Most nights we would have called one stop and a failure an evening well-hunted and returned home to make up crazy stories but that was not this night. This night was destined to become the Watermelon Ice Cream Incident.
And so we ventured on towards Whole Foods a sure fire for your oddly flavored normal foods. Soon we found ourselves standing in front of the large section of ice creams with flavors of fruits I hadn’t even heard. We found flavors we hadn’t imagined people would want ice cream to taste like (and I’ve watched Iron Chef before) but no watermelon. We even asked an employee who told us that they’d just run out. I take that as proof fate was against us that night.
So we moved on, winding our way further from our homes. We found ourselves at Wegmans and believe me their parking garage is not somewhere you want to get lost in at night, no directions to find your way to the entrance, the exit, or even the store itself.
Yeah, I know, this is a boring story about me driving around with my friend to find some ice cream but there’s something between the driving and listening to Slippery When Wet. There’s the feeling between the actual trajectory and the goal that makes a simple experience like driving to find watermelon ice cream an adventure referenced for years after as one of those great nights. You know you’re in it when you slide your windows down during “Livin’ on a Prayer” and the driver beside you smiles. Something out of the ordinary happens and you know this moment you can’t replicate it, you can’t grasp it but you’re making a memory. And that moment is so sweet, as sweet as watermelon ice cream.
A year later in Spain we found our watermelon ice cream
