The Ice Cream Social

Here I am inside today bemoaning the fact that the Ice Cream Social is taking place on the public square and I’m home nursing a terrible cold. And, unless I want to go around carrying a box of Kleenex with me, my trip to this event will probably not take place.

The Ice Cream Social is a great event not only for merchandising the wears of the merchants and local people, but it’s the best place to see people you only see once a year or maybe once every five or ten years. People enjoy standing around visiting or setting in lawn chairs they have brought for the occasion.  And, if the weather cooperates, that makes it so much better.

I recall when I was growing up, Saturday night was the time for visiting on the square. The merchants always kept their stores open and usually enjoyed a pretty hefty business.  Of course, when I was growing up, there wasn’t a highway running right through the middle of town so the kids could run all over the shaded, circular, park like area.  We would climb over the benches and chase each other until our faces were beet red and we would fall over on the grass to cool off. Parents would set around visiting in the park or stroll around the square, stopping occasionally to window shop or go inside to see what new merchandise was on display. In the early years, there was a bandstand, as I recall, and there was always band music being played by members of the school band or occasionally, an older person who was still young at heart and enjoyed playing their instrument of choice.

I have often wondered if the generations that have come on after mine could be entertained as easily. Have we grown so accustomed to being entertained by the “bloob tube” or the internet that we have forgotten how to visit with our neighbors?  Are our activities so organized for us that we run ourselves crazy with one parent carting one kid to soccer while the other takes the other child to dance?  Is there no time spent together as a family just enjoying each other without having our cellphones set on ready and certainly within arm’s reach? Do we even know our neighbors or the merchants in town? Do we even care to know them?

 “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.”Mark 12:30-31 NIV