thirty americans licking ice cream cones

 We were thirty, weary Americans ill-dressed for the slate wind that collided with our bare legs, the rain that collected in the spaces between our toes; thirty Americans in shorts and chacos, shivering in restless groups of three and four as we waited for the bus that would take us back to Quito. Thirty Americans, we marveled at how quickly one can grow accustomed to a good thing, and only hours before had been sticky with ocean salt and our own sweat, strolling the sandy, unpaved streets of the Galapagos.

We were thirty Americans going home. Or not “home,” exactly, but to what we thought of as “home” when we were away. And though thirty, sun-scorched Americans had all expressed reluctance to leave the islands, to re-enter the inevitable obligations of the day-to-day, we were also thirty Americans who, looking out through the bus windows at the familiar mountains that loomed on either side and the dark clouds that shielded their volcanic peaks, felt oddly relieved to be going “home” again.

And so it was with great surprise that—subdued, quiet, and buried in our seats—we thirty Americans noticed that our bus had stopped abruptly on the edge of a narrow thoroughfare.

“Okay. Chicos,” Martha announced from the head of the bus. “The bus-driver is treating us to ice cream.”

We looked at each other in bewilderment, startled from our wearied stupors but failing, still, to register Martha’s words.

“The bus driver is the owner of this ice cream shop,” Martha explained, “and he wants to treat you all to ice cream.” Still no one moved. “Vamos, chicos!” She said decisively, and, obediently, we all began to move, re-fastening our shoes and zipping our windbreakers and shuffling out of the bus.

Really, it wasn’t a great day for ice cream—it was cold, it was rainy, we were travel worn and ready to be home—but regardless, we found ourselves almost giddy with this unprecedented surprise, this final “hurrah” to a week spent snorkeling, and peeling salmon-colored shrimp, and coating ourselves in sunblock on the Islands.

The bus driver gave us the option of two flavors; I asked him for his favorites. “Taxo and chocolate,” he said without hesitation. I repeated the same line to the employee scooping ice cream.

Licking our cones, we milled in the small parlor and waited for the last stragglers, asking each other about our flavor selections and ultimately boarding the bus with our cones only half-eaten. We thanked the bus driver effusively and wondered what compelled him to such generosity. Not long after, we stepped off the bus, hauled up our heavy-backpacks, and, thirty weary Americans, trudged home.

After the excitement of the Galapagos, the extraordinary privilege of the Galapagos, the simplicity of this moment was nevertheless indelible. I wonder what compelled a bus driver to treat us, thirty Americans just returned from a trip to the Galapagos, to such a generous gesture. Why? Being a bus driver and the dueño of a small ice cream parlor, I can’t imagine the man was drowning in excess. What compelled him, then, to treat us to such excess?

Ultimately, I cannot think of any feasible reason for his gesture. Unwarranted generosity, I suppose, is the only explanation. I guess I’ll just have to leave it at that, then: at the mystery. (And perhaps allow myself marvel, at odd moments when it inevitably resurfaces, at the memory.)