Not Ice, But "Ice"

In the second paragraph of the New York Times' recent piece on ice, the author admits that the premise of his article is "kooky or risible" to almost everyone in the country. Normally that would be grounds for not publishing an article about gourmet ice. But this is the Times, and the people have to know.

The article is primarily a forum for meditation on the nature of ice. The zen-like president of the Ice Council offers these insights to the receptive reporter:

• "Ice is a food"
  
• "Ice is water's sister product"
  
• "Not all ice is the same"

I think that pins it down pretty well. On a scarier note, the article profiles some of the people who Care about ice. "Carolyn Polk," it says, "did not start out as an 'ice snob'". On one level, I'm tempted to say, well, who does? But as I come to think of it, I realize that ice snobbery could happen to anybody. I laugh now, but in a few years, will I be so sanguine about the air bubbles in my ice cubes? Do you have to be predisposed to get upset about a colorless, tasteless, odorless "food", or could this obsession truly claim anyone?

Ms. Polk, we learn, was introduced to ice snobbery by her friends, comforting evidence that such a kooky and risible preoccupation can't just develop spontaneously. Still, she offers this moving coda, which speaks to anybody who thought the Style section could never happen to them:

“I never really thought ice mattered that much to me. At first, all I wanted to do was make my guests happy. But once you go there, you go there, I guess."