Ice Cream Man

The law may say it is a crime to smoke cannabis. The reality says it is not. Most of us know more realities than we know law. - Paul St. Pierre



As I was sitting here thinking of something to write about (there is always something) and listening to cowboy music on WDVX-FM, Sonja hollered to me from the living room, "The Ice Cream Man is coming!" I looked out the window and sure enough the Ice Cream Man was rolling along the street at about one mph. Too bad the Ice Cream Man could not sell beer from his van. That is why I am an Anarchist: the Ice Cream Man cannot sell beer. That's bullshit, not being able to sell cold beer from a van with a perfectly good cooler. And bad for the environment I might add. Most people around here get in their car when they run out of beer and go get some. Why not buy it from someone who is out driving around anyhow? The world, in case you have not noticed, is fucked up beyond all recognition.

I never sold ice cream from a van making bad music to let all the kids know he was in the neighbourhood. The pay is shit. But I did know a few guys who were ice cream men some summers because they could get paid cash under the table every day. Why work over the table when the money you make under the table does not get reported to the cheapskate government where your regular money comes from?

Those guys drove around smoking bombers all day. Anybody who thinks you cannot drive safe smoking bombers all day should add up how many kids have been run over by ice cream vans over the years. Not very fucking many. They made better than $100 cash from the ice cream boss plus however much they could shortchange the dumb motherfucking kids who swarmed their van - usually enough to buy a case of beer for the drive home.

When I was walking Strangler one summer evening smoking a bomber of my own I saw a couple of them, Daryl and Rudy, driving down a main road 100 mph in their ice cream van. They were going fast but I could still see they were passing a joint back and forth. When I asked them about it later Rudy told me, "Fucking rights. I thought I saw you and Strangler. How is your fucking dog anyway? We were smoking a big hash spliff. Black Afghan. The fucking best. How else could anybody put up with all the little motherfuckers, half of them without enough money to buy a fucking popsicle, reaching their dirty fingers up into the van? We didn't think that van could top 100 mph with a load of ice cream in it but it did! You don't make any money on the motherfucking main roads!"