Evening ice cream

I don't remember all of the details. I do remember the main beats.

It was a summer night like tonight. The temperature was in the high twenties. Warm, but while the basement was far more pleasant, we didn't need to camp down there. I had gone on a long bike ride that day. The kids were down and it was still light out. Hillary, as was her routine during the early to mid summer of 2018, was in bed. I'll ballpark this as about 8:30 at night.

Since I had gone on a long ride earlier in the day, I was hungry again. I didn't feel like anything particularly healthy and we were out of ice cream.

A thought occurred to me, "I'm a grown ass man. If I want to get Dairy Queen, I can do that."

So I headed upstairs and told Hillary my plan to get a blizzard or something from DQ. She was already settled into bed and beginning to fade.

"That's a great idea," she said with a smile. A smile that if you didn't know her better you might have mistaken for condescension or something like that. It wasn't though. It was, however, a smile and expression that was new in our lives. It's sort of complicated to try to get the full meaning across but I'll try. You'll have to take my word for it, Hillary had a very expressive face.

It was an understanding that I was depressed and in a lot of pain facing the unknown. It was an acknowledgement that I was going to do something small that I might enjoy. It was a thing she could do to help me, even if that meant just being in the house with the kids while they slept so I could do a thing. It was also tinged with sadness that it was a thing we weren't going to share in.

There was probably more in there. It was a very complicated time.

So I got something. I drove home and sat in bed beside her while she slept. Then I went to do the dishes.

It was a summer night like tonight. I went on a long ride this morning and the kids are in bed. But in this new life of a single parent, the option of going out after they are in bed is no longer there. I won't lie. Before they were actually asleep, I seriously debated packing them into the car.

The only ice cream in the house right now is one Hillary bought last summer. It's a really good dairy free fruit thing.

I've pulled it out of the deep freeze at least a dozen times and always put it back. I've actually moved it up to the fridge freezer now. Maybe that will do.