The two things that I have been craving more than anything else for the past few months are strawberries and ice cream. I want them all the time…in fact, I would like them now, please.
The strawberry obsession is fairly particular (strawberries, in a bowl, no fussing around), but the ice cream thing is far more flexible: if I have my druthers, I’d like a banana split, but anything will do, really. And the other day, what came readily to hand was some Rocky Road from the Baskin Robbins over on 44th and 10th.
If I am lucky enough to find myself in a Baskin Robbins, I am ordering Rocky Road, and you cannot stop me. It’s been that way ever since the sixth grade, when one opened up just around the corner from my school and quickly became The Coolest Place Ever. It was at that Baskin Robbins, actually, that I had my very first date, and my very first abortive attempt at a kiss.
I took my best friend Tyler along with me on the date, because in sixth grade it was really crucial that we spend the entire time freaking out and giggling rather than paying any sort of attention to the poor dude. He took us to Baskin Robbins, because, like I said, it was the see-and-be-seen hotspot of the moment, and bought me a cup of Rocky Road (I was too shy to order a cone, which was what I really wanted; I thought a cup was more ladylike). And he (grudgingly) bought Tyler one too, which I thought was unspeakably chivalrous, and most definitely merited a serious commitment.
And so Tyler and I had a little whispered conference in the corner, and decided that I should kiss him (squee!). We walked down the street, with me saying “Should I?!” and her saying “YES!” over and over (and over and over and over), obviously making me appear extremely alluring to the guy (who almost straight-up left a few times). Finally I got up my nerve: I stopped in my tracks, put my hands on his shoulders (feisty, no?), closed my eyes, leaned in…
And kissed him flat on the ear. Like, in the center part, where what you’re really doing is kissing air and making an opening-soda-can noise. He responded by making the single most disgusted face I had ever seen on a person in my life (up until that point, anyway) and promptly telling everybody at school that I had kissed his ear. And for the rest of the year, I was “Kissed Him…But She Missed Him.”
Aw.
But at least the ice cream was spectacular.
