Nothing signals a heatwave in Dublin like suits eating 99s.
In St Stephen’s Green, I watch a man place his briefcase by his left leg. As he chases the dribble of a melting 99 around his right hand, I wonder if there is a more delightful scene to be found in the city. He abandons the leather holdall as if to say: now, at last, I can get down to the real work of the day.
These are perhaps my favourite of Dublin’s summertime characters, second only to its sandwich-eaters who willingly brave the sniper-sharp intent of its seagulls. (I recently watched a woman steal a meal deal back off a brazen bird, earning her a well-deserved round of applause and my eternal admiration.)
They walk among us unnoticed in the winter months, these people with “proper” jobs and work clothes. Swishing across town with calls to take and meetings to attend, they usually seem so important and sure of themselves. They represent a kind of adulthood that eludes me still at 26.
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The kind of people who have the sort of information that seems useless until someone is asking for it – what “the economy” is and things like that.
Put a 99 in their hand, however, and it is hard to take them so seriously. Watching this man in St Stephen’s Green with his tie loosened and top button opened, I am no longer intimidated by the fact that he could probably explain to me how and why exchange rates work. Right now I can see that he is struggling to avoid being poked in the eye by his chocolate flake (“either chew as you go or shove it down”, I want to scream).
I wonder how often it is that these suits get a moment’s peace like this. When else can they take a step off of the treadmill and trust that no one will pull them back on to it until they have ingested the pointed end of this wafer cone? No one could dare interrupt such an indulgence. Who could be so cruel? There is something truly cynical about interrupting a 99 with anything other than a nod of approval.
On Baggot Street, I notice a group of workers briskly walking back to the office, cones in hand. They have a look on their faces thatsuggests they have already got away with something. I can tell whose idea it was by the rosy-cheeked giddiness of the lad biting into the arched top of the freshly swirled 99.
Beside him, a woman takes a double lap around her cone, struggling to keep up as it melts. I feel happy for her that this high-speed chase is the most urgent problem she faces for the moment – and not the presentation she is due to give in T-minus seven minutes. Right now, she has only sticky fingers to worry about and the dribble making a beeline across her wrist for the cuff of her blouse.
Few other treats give you such total freedom from the machinations of daily life. Coffees, cigarettes, snacks – these are all just functional ways of breaking up the day and, let’s face it, you can always answer an email at the same time. There is a precarity to the 99 that commands your attention and puts the relentlessness of routine on hold.
Try to do anything productive with a 99 in hand. I dare you. Write a to-do list. Fill out that survey. Give someone directions. You will quickly realise that no suit is sharp enough to reassert the authority undermined by some ice-cream under your nose.
So long as that cone is in your hand, you are its hostage. You might have an actual meeting to attend or a real spreadsheet to fill but right now and until you are finished, this ice-cream is your boss – and you are clocked in and required to stay on message.
Perhaps this is what I find so charming about suits eating 99s. For once, I actually understand their struggle. There is a shared humanity in that. More often than not, I wonder who told them about five-year-plans and pensions and forgot to keep me in the loop.
I often question whether there is a watershed moment at which we all “grow up”.
[ I’m not sure who won the battle of the complimentsOpens in new window ]
Is there a point at which you irrevocably achieve full adult status beyond simply existing for 18 years? Some certificate in life experience? A diploma for remembering to get rinse aid for the dishwasher and a set of thank you cards for when you next need them?
Or is the notion of a before and after being younger and older just a nice story we tell ourselves to make us think that we will, at some point, have it all figured out? The kick my friend (and neighbour) and I got from the walkie-talkies we recently acquired makes me think so.
We can tell ourselves all we want that there is some kind of a separation between young or old. But ultimately there is nothing discreet about eating a 99. Those suits on their lunch break are sure proof of that.
[ I went to visit my old school. Big mistake. At 25 I now feel ancientOpens in new window ]
During these summertime heatwaves, they are a welcome reminder that what we knew as children is as useful to us as adults (and probably more helpful than any factoid about the economy): some are better than others, but there is no such thing as a bad 99.
