While TB and I were recently in an airport waiting on a connecting flight, he disappeared and came back with a surprise. A large waffle cone with chocolate ice cream. Yummy!
Like a greedy 4 year old, I reached out to snatch it out of his hands..... just as he was taking a big bite out of the side of my ice cream cone. What????!!!! A mouthful of my ice cream and my cone - all at once. At that moment I realized two things:
1. He bought the ice cream cone for us to share.
2. He had just ruined it.
Now, I will admit that it was a slighly selfish thought to think this whole thing was for me. I'm willing to share. And I quickly conceeded that point. But only that point. He still ruined the ice cream cone.
Everyone knows there's a proper way to eat an ice cream cone. I mean we've all seen that messy kid that lets the ice cream get away from him and seems oblivious to it dripping all over his arm and clothes while he's eagerly chowing down. Picture that in a grown man and you know what I experienced in that airport.
After his huge bite of our shared cone, I weighed my options. I was willing to share, but that thought was based on a non-ruined ice cream cone. Am I allowed not to share, if he ruined it? Do I go buy my own? Or do I still make an attempt to share?
As these thoughts are quickly running through my head, TB holds out his chocolate dripping hand to pass me the cone. I hesitantly took the cone for my turn. Seeing the gaping hole in the side of the cone, I had to take preventative measures and clean up his mess by licking up all the impending drips. Which meant, I didn't get to eat any of the cone. The best part. In the corner of my eye, I can see him working his way through a mountain of napkins attempting to quickly clean up the chocolate drippage before his next turn. On his next turn and much to my horror, he takes another big bite of cone/ice cream and hands it back to me. Again. Preventative measures. This back and forth went on for a few turns and then TB asks an interesting question.
"Oh. I didn't know you don't like waffle cones. Why aren't you eating any of the cone?"
Really. The nerve.
I had to explain that because of his reckless eating style that I had to use my turns to make sure we didn't end up looking like 4 year olds with ice cream from head to toe and I just never had a chance to eat the cone.
After a thoughtful, "Hmmm." TB made an interesting observation. He said, "I think the way we each eat the ice cream cone reflects our personalities."
Now that's a thought.
TB dove in head first when he saw something he liked, without regard for the consequences. He would fix those later, and maybe it didn't matter in the grand sceme of things if he ended up with ice cream all over the place. At least he enjoyed the best part of the ice cream cone.
I took a step back and looked at the ice cream cone as a whole and came up with a plan. Eat the ice cream at the top first since it has the potential to make a mess. Then, when it's perfectly eaten and safe, it's OK to go for the ice cream cone. All the while, monitoring the ice cream and it's potential for mess creation.
Is it a scientifically sound study? Probably not. But I think it does hold a bit of truth in our situation.
Conclusion: Me. Slightly neurotic. Him. Slightly less neurotic.
There's method to the madness. There is only 1 way to eat an ice cream cone. It is in a very systematic way. You cannot, I repeat, cannot let it drip on you.
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