 Friday, April 15, 2005
Back in the mid-70s, on the way home from church, my brother and sister and I would begin the chant "Stop and Get a Malt, Malt, Malt, Malt. Stop and get a Malt, Malt, Malt, Malt". The destination implied was Jolly's Root Beer stand, which in addition to frosted mugs of the coldest root beer shy of Anchorage, they had delicious malts. They might've had shakes too but shakes were never even considered. Even the word "shake" didn't have the power or authority that "malt" had. In retrospect I thought we batted about .333, a respectable average. Rod Carew numbers anyway. But my brother recently said that he remembers the chant but not the payoff. He never remembers getting a malt. This surprised me, but then he is six years younger and it’s possible that most of the "hits" were early in our career. I think if I'd gotten any more malts they'd have been taken for granted, any fewer and I'd have wondered why we didn't get more. A balance rare. We might've gone more often during the summer for root beer though I can't be sure. I've never gotten close to as thirsty as an adult as I did as a kid. I assume it was because caught up in play you manage to forget about drinking or eating for awhile. But when I was ten, eleven I could work up a thirst that was other-worldly and the other-worldly antidote was Jolly's Root Beer. It was impossible to sip; I recall downing it in two gulps, two long powerful gulps with the ice shavings from the glass as the cherry topping. And I remember thinking there never was a drink invented that quenched thirst better than Jolly's Root Beer. • • • • •
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