It’s bigger than butterflies, changing clocks, crocus, or — arguably — even pinkletinks. Nothing marks the coming of spring quite like a gang of kids running at full bore for the Edgartown Dairy Queen.
In this Island’s version of Pamplona’s running of the bulls, children pelt down from the Edgartown School to be first in line at the soft serve ice cream outlet when it opens in March.
This past Tuesday afternoon, four teenagers who came straight from the high school sat outside eating Blizzards and enjoying the calm before the storm. They too, in their time, longed to be at the front of the line at the Dairy Queen. “We used to beat each other to get ahead,” remembers Maeve McAuliffe.
At 2:50 p.m. the stampede began. “They’re coming!” shouted the high school girls, in unison, as Ryan Gosson appeared, in the lead, on a bike. Close behind was a kid on a skateboard, ahead of three boys running at a sprint.
Approaching the building, some vaulted over the porch fence rather than tackle the stairs.
Within minutes more than a dozen kids were gulping down soft serves. Ryan stood outside with friends his Cody Willoughby, Nick Costello and Vitor Mouzinho, spooning in ice cream, disputing who arrived in pole position.
Will Jurczeyk, who got a cookiedough blizzard, didn’t want to be weighed down, so he left his backpack at school. “I have to go back and get it” he said.
Taylor Poggi said her class got out just a minute before the others, giving her the edge that was crucial to her early showing.
By 3 p.m. the store was packed, but Dairy Queen patrons continued to flow in steadily from the direction of the elementary school.
Between bites of a small vanilla cone with cherry dip, Eliot Ferland said he had been looking forward to this day since Dairy Queen closed last fall. He asked his dad pick him up from school that day, rather than taking the bus home, so they could make the stop. Al Ferland, Eliot’s dad, summed it up. “It’s a big day for the Island,” he said.
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