Dear Ice Cream Truck Driver

Dear Ice Cream Truck Driver,

I know you are stalking me. At the beginning, our casual encounters seemed to be mere coincidence, but I'm on to it now. The first time, you circled the pool at my apartment complex several times in the heat of the summer. Big deal! Right? It seemed fitting for you to pick a crowd of hot pool gatherers for your next target. Then, I started hearing you in the evenings inside of my apartment - coming from the parking lot. Your music painfully lingered way too long - after digging for cash and battling my inner voice warning me against, I decided that I had probably waited too long, you would be pulling away as I reached the bottom of my staircase. Ten minutes later, when I still heard the jingling tunes, I realized I was wrong. It was like you were waiting on me. I kept thinking of those chocolate Mickey Mouse bars with the hard chocolate ears filled with soft vanilla ice cream... I thought about the orange sherbert push-up pops with Fred Barney's face on it... The always delicious strawberry crunch bar.... No Monica! Stop it! You don't need ice cream, I have been trying to convince myself that ignoring you is the right thingto do. I have successfully (and sometimes barely) dodged your temptations for several months. But the final straw came the other day when I heard your truck while I was walking through campus headed to my afternoon class.

Listen, Ice Cream Truck Driver, this has got to stop. First of all - it's October! Aren't you supposed to stop after the kids go back to school? Second of all - I am trying to reorganize the way my mind thinks of nutrition. Vegetables and fruit now stand in place of hot pockets and the loveable Kit Kat bar in my new and improved food pyramid. I don't even eat white bread anymore; I'm officially a whole wheat kind of girl. BUT YOU TEMPTING ME WITH YOUR LUCIOUS SUGARY TREATS ON A DAY TO DAY BASIS IS REALLY STARTING TO ANNOY ME. You were cute at first, with your "Music Box/Lullaby" tunes parading around my life. But if I have to hear your music again, I might crack my will power, run out to your freezer on wheels, and buy two (no three!) of everything you sell, eating them one by one while you watch in disgust.

Can I step away for a moment and ponder this: WHO THOUGHT OF THAT MUSIC? Who was sitting around a seminar table, before the world was plagued with ice cream trucks, pitching the idea of nomadically selling ice cream, and proposed - "How 'bout we play a handbell rendition of Turkey in the Straw, just to pack the punch?". Evil people, these ice cream distributors are. Maybe we should blame them for the obesity in America... sorry, stepping off the soapbox.

But seriously, Ice Cream Truck Driver, stop sitting in my immediate vicinity with your siren(ish) seduction, begging me to add your ice cream to my already full belly. I stand firm on the choice to not be a consumer in your sea of frozen treats, so give up already...

The next time you are around, I will make sure to have absolutely no cash (not even nickels or dimes) within a close reach. I will then grab some raw vegetables and hummus and run out to finally face you, the perpetrator in my otherwise nutritious/healthy life. When you ask if I would like some ice cream, Ice Cream Truck Driver, I will pop a carrot in my mouth, smile and tell you a lie, "Sorry, I'm lactose intolerant." Maybe then you'll get the hint and find someone else's neighborhood to victimize.