Barbara Daniels The Ice Box The grocery store sample man offers pale slices of orange-melon—some new genetic mix. I try the grape-apple, flavor of grape, apple texture. I didn't grow up with that, Grandma used to say, a sniffed dismissal. I grew up with lugs of cherries that filled whole shelves in the ice box, refrigerator really, but we said ice box to honor the years of blocks of ice bundled in straw, heavy tongs, leaking drip trays. Grandma lost trees to hail five years in a row, emptying her square of prairie. South Dakota hurled down hailstones Mom gathered to make ice cream. Real cream, that's what she grew up with. Pheasants cooked in sour cream. An orange at Christmas. A long, flat horizon, driving snow. May I offer you cherries? A slice of real melon, rich sweetness you first tasted a lifetime ago?

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