Ice Cream Sunday - A Farmer Story
By Dana Short
The Farmer hummed to himself as he set the smaller bucket with the mixing blades inside the larger bucket.
Next, he poured several chunks of crushed ice into the larger outside bucket, and judiciously added a bit of salt from the small bag.
He then poured the liquid contents of his mixing bowl into the smaller bucket, and very carefully shook a bit of salt in as well, before closing the lid on the inner bucket, and starting up the Ice Cream machine.
He glanced at some unseen object a bit down the road from his own place, and then headed inside his house, leaving the machine crunching ice, and churning the contents with the ice cream blades.
-o-
Aaron Mill sat on his porch, and watched the approach of Sammel Watters’s buggy, pulled by that horse, what’s his name, oh yeah, Phil.
As the buggy turned up his drive, Aaron stood up, figuring he was gonna have to deal with his neighbor yet again.
"Afternoon, Watters," Aaron called out as the buggy creaked to a stop, and the Farmer and Katelyn, his daughter climbed out. Katelyn shading her eyes from the warm, summer sun.
"Ello!" the Farmer responded.
"What brings ya by my place today? Still hopin I’ll give up an sell it to ya? I won’t ya know. This place has belonged to the Mill’s since we first moved to this country, and I ain’t movin, even if I am the last o’ my line," Aaron said walking up to the buggy, "I plan to stay here fer ever, I do."
"Nah, I’ve given up on that. Might make ya’ll an offer fer some o yer water next year, iffn I still need it, but oerwise, I’ll let ya set. Ya can stay here fer ever, iffn ya has a mind ta. Don’t make me no mind," The Farmer replied, stepping up along side his horse, and patting him along his neck. "Nope. I juss wanted ta bring ya a piece offerin, ta help ta break th’ summer."
"Err..." said Aaron, squinting at the Farmer, "What kind o piece offerin would tha’ be?"
"Ice Cream!" Chirped Katelyn, stepping to the back of the buggy. "An old family recipe! Pa made it just for you!"
"Ice cream?" Aaron repeated, looking again at the elder Watters. "Why in heavens would ya wanna make me Ice cream?"
"I doan wanna make You ice cream," the Farmer muttered to him self, then much more audibly said "It’s a hot , an I had the fixins laying ‘round my place, I couldn’t eat no more, an so’s I figured ya might wan it."
"Well, I reckon I could stand ta try it least," Aaron mused, watching Katelyn as she pulled a small tub from an ice filled bucket in the back of the buggy. "Wha’ kind is it, anyhow?"
"It’s Vanilla!" Katelyn beamed, "But we also brought you some of my chocolate fudge, and a spot of whipped cream. You can make yourself a Sundae!"
"Hmmm... A sundae on a Sunday, almost seems, fittin, somehows," Aaron nodded. "Well, Sammel, I’m mighty obliged ta ya’ll. I’ll just stuff it in my Fridge, and whip it up fer dessert after supper. I thank ya."
"An I’ll thank ya next year, come growin season, I will," the Farmer replied, offering Aaron’s his hand, "Thank ya fer some water."
"I think we could dig you a ditch from my stream over to your place, getchya a bit more water ‘n ya gets outa that little crick of yours, anyhow," Aaron said, shaking his hand, "Yep, I think we can make ourselves a deal."
With that, the Watters’s climbed back into their buggy, and headed back up the road, Katelyn giving a happy little wave.
Aaron took the ice cream into his house and set it in the freezer, putting the whipped cream in the refrigerator, and the fudge on the back of the stove, where it would heat up a bit while he cooked dinner.
-o-
As Aaron finished his dinner that evening, he stood and stretched at the table, then gathering his dishes, dumped them into the sink, and pulled a bowl out of he cupboard.
Next, he took out the little tub of Ice Cream, and scooped it into the bowl, then he took the warm fudge from the back of the stove, and poured it onto the ice cream. Finally, he pulled out the whipped cream, and dolloped a couple spoonfuls on top of it all.
Taking his bowl, he wandered out to his back porch, so he could watch the sun set as he enjoyed the desert.
The Ice cream was really good. Pretty much the best he had ever had, and the fudge was definitely the best he had ever tasted. That Katelyn was an excellent cook, and she wasn’t hard on the eyes either. She would make some lucky fellow an excellent wife, one of these days. About the only complaint he could make about the Ice Cream was it was a bit salty. Every once in a while, he would crunch a bit of the salt used to make it. He figured old Watters needed a new Ice Cream Maker.
He had pretty much finished the ice cream, and was getting ready to rise, when he noticed he couldn’t move his feet.
They seemed to be stuck to the ground, and try as he might, he couldn’t lift them more than a couple inches.
He bent over to look down, but he didn’t see his feet, all he saw at the end of his legs was a rock. A big round rock.
He stood anyhow, and noted as he did so, that his legs seemed to sink into the stone, and it actually seemed to grow larger.
He watched in a almost disconnected wonder, his mind in a state of shock as his legs just seemed to sink into the stone and vanish, leaving a smooth ever thickening surface. As he sank to his crotch, he broke out of his trance, and took a deep breath to let out a scream of horror, but even as he did so, the process seemed to accelerate! He sank faster, and before he could holler, his torso, and even his arms were gone.
His head was only a bit over a foot above the floor and his neck starting to sink into the stone as he tilted his head back, and opened his mouth wide in a silent, final scream.
As his head melted into the center of the stone, his mouth made a round hole, which deepened until it reached all the way through, and the stone gave a final jelly like quiver, and set it’s self in it’s new shape, that of a large rounded stone wheel, with a hole in the middle.
-o-
"Well, Katelyn, come next season, we should have been able ta buy the Mill’s place, an we can have all th’ water we need, an you can even grind yerself your own flour, with ol’ Phil hooked up to that new Mill Stone." The Farmer mused.
"That wasn’t very nice, Pa, I mean, I know he was a pain, but did we have to do that to him? He might have sold us the water next year, if we needed it again."
He didn’t sell it ta me this year, didn’ even offer ta, iffn he sold it ta me nex year, he’d a wanted more’n it was worth, I tell ya! I doan wan another crop dyin’ like this one almost did!" The Farmer replied venomously.
"Well, if you say so. You had best clean up this mess though, before anything gets spilled." Katelyn said, gesturing around the kitchen.
"Yes Katelyn," the farmer replied, gathering his things, as Katelyn began cleaning the dishes in the sink, "I’ll fetch it back right now."
As the Farmer put the bag away in his shed, he made extra sure that it was positioned so he could easily read the side labeled "Rock Salt".
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