one of the things i love about where we live now is the spontaneous urge to re-discover the familiar. a few weeks ago while entertaining my folks at our new home, we finished dinner and i realized we hadn't thought to get a dessert. "no problem" i said. "why don't we all go to fenton's?" mom clapped her hands. the kids all asked "what's fenton's?" and soon we were in the car and headed down the road to oakland. for those who still don't know, fenton's is a long standing east bay stop for some of the finest iced cream you will ever find. what a book could be written on the thousands of birthdays, first dates, after game celebrations, anniversaries and the like all shared here. in fact as we ordered and then waited patiently at the table making crayon masterpieces on our paper tablecloth, we joined in on no less than 3 rousing choruses of "happy birthday" for tables nearby. proving that the good times shared with complete strangers over ice cream is enough to momentarily satisfy our human longing for community. i guess some other folks know it too as evidenced here in the final scene of pete docter's last film "up". and now i see from our crayon box souvenir that they even have a location in the new nut tree plaza. good reason to stop the next time we travel up to sac to see our friends there too.
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