“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, "Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping." To this day, especially in times of "disaster," I remember my mother's words and I am always comforted by realizing that there are still so many helpers – so many caring people in this world.”

“Often when you think you're at the end of something, you're at the beginning of something else.”

“The greatest gift you ever give is your honest self.”

“Who we are in the present includes who we were in the past.”

It's very dramatic when two people come together to work something out. It's easy to take a gun and annihilate your opposition, but what is really exciting to me is to see people with differing views come together and finally respect each other.

“At the center of the Universe is a loving heart that continues to beat and that wants the best for every person. Anything that we can do to help foster the intellect and spirit and emotional growth of our fellow human beings, that is our job. Those of us who have this particular vision must continue against all odds. Life is for service.”


Fred Rogers

From Elizabeth Hudson: Frozen in Time

For our editor in chief, summer nostalgia is found in memories of tomato sandwiches and running through the sprinkler — but nothing embodies the joy of a carefree July day better than an ice cream cone.

by Elizabeth Hudson

Purchase collections of Elizabeth Hudson’s columns at ourstatestore.com.

On those sweltering July days, my grandmother and I ate tomato sandwiches and chilled cucumber slices soaked in vinegar for lunch to keep from heating up the stove. She tied a thin scarf around her hair to fend off the relentless sun and set up the sprinkler so I could play in the yard in my bathing suit. In the afternoons, drained from the summer heat, we sat on the front porch, waiting for my grandfather to come home from the golf course, his neck slightly sunburned, his shirt damp and clinging to his back.

He’d join us on the porch, letting the afternoon breeze cool him off, and after a few minutes, he’d rise from his chair, catch my eye, and give me a wink.

I’d jump up and follow him inside to the kitchen, where he’d pull out a half-gallon of Sealtest vanilla ice cream from the freezer and expertly scoop perfect rounds of ice cream into two tall glasses.

I knew exactly what was coming next: From the refrigerator, he’d loop two fingers around a couple of glass-bottle Coca-Colas and pop the caps — a satisfying tssk — with a metal opener. Then he’d pour the fizzy soda over the ice cream, creating a froth that bubbled up to the rim. He’d hand me a spoon and I’d stir gently, the way he taught me, blending the creamy swirls into the dark soda, that icy first sip sending a shiver of delight through me.

I only knew my grandfather in the twilight of his years, but drinking those Coke floats with him, noticing how he playfully slid the glass to me, how he’d slurp the last drops with a boyish grin, I saw that he’d been a child once, too, the son of a Franklinville postmaster, a kid who’d skipped rocks in the Deep River and thrown baseballs with his seven brothers and sisters. In those moments with my grandfather, I glimpsed his youth.

Could it be that something so simple as ice cream holds a secret, that the fountain of youth may actually have been a soda fountain?

I only need to pull on the door handle of Yum Yum Better Ice Cream on the campus of UNCG to be whisked back 35 years, when I’d duck in after exams, when there were still card catalogs in the library and pay phones in the dorms.

I can drink a chocolate milkshake from John’s Drive-In in Kitty Hawk and immediately think of my dad, who loved nothing more than a well-made shake and kept an egg-shaped Hamilton Beach DrinkMaster on our kitchen counter, always at the ready.

In high school, before the bypass rerouted Asheboro traffic, my friends and I would cruise down old U.S. 220 to the beach, stopping at Seagrove Dairy Breeze for a dipped soft-serve cone, the day stretching out as long as that open road. Time was endless then.

Throughout North Carolina, I see families making their way to places like Yum Yum, settling into the rocking chairs on the porch at Calabash Creamery, at Maple View Farm in Hillsborough. They climb into the wooden booths at Yarborough’s in Sanford and S&T’s in Pittsboro. They place their orders, and then the cones, the sundaes, the milkshakes, the banana splits, arrive and melt away the years. With ice cream in hand, we are all children of summer, forever young.

Elizabeth Hudson
Editor in Chief

This story was published on Jun 24, 2024

Elizabeth Hudson

Hudson is a native of North Carolina who grew up in the small community of Farmer, near Asheboro. She holds a B.A. degree in English from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and began her publishing career in 1997 at Our State magazine. She held various editorial titles for 10 years before becoming Editor in Chief in 2009. For her work with the magazine, Hudson is also the 2014 recipient of the Ethel Fortner Writer and Community Award, an award that celebrates contributions to the literary arts of North Carolina.

They're selling them big.

STINKBONE

 oldviolin wrote:

grossly amusing in its irrelevance...

 lovehonk wrote:

wow, super cool. I spent a week in Hong Kong back in 1990 staying with my sister there, who was living on their boat in the harbour. One week. and massive impressions. even flying in was a blast. I knew about the the low level approach between the high rises (yes it was really between the buildings)  but I wasn't prepared for the steep banking the pilots had to do at about 300 feet  to hit the runway. Crazy shit. Another time at about 2 in the morning I went up on deck to take a pee into the water (we were moored about half a mile offshore) and just when I was about to let rip, this row of white teeth suddenly appeared about 50 m away. By the time my eyes adjusted, I saw it was a special police hit squad waiting in a high powered RIB to intercept car smugglers, all blacked out and equipped with machine guns. I went over to the starboard side instead.


edit (told these stories before, hoping we all have mild dementia)

Bianca Tse & the Kowloon Walled City