Feelin' Hot! Hot! Hot!

It’s too darn hot.

Okay, I know it’s summer. I know it’s supposed to be hot. I know that, technically, the “dog days” of summer start in early July and run through September. But I am not mentally or physically prepared to deal with so many super-hot days in a row in mid-July.

Did you ever see the Twilight Zone episode called “The Midnight Sun”? In this episode, the earth has changed its elliptical orbit and is inching closer to the sun. Throughout the episode, the few remaining residents of New York City suffer as the temperature climbs higher, thermometers explode and paintings melt.
These past few weeks feel like that episode.

My thermometer is not in danger of exploding, but watching it hit temperatures in the high 80’s and low 90’s every single day is getting old. Though we don’t have central air conditioning, we do have window units that cut the humidity and keep us cool enough to sleep at night. It’s not fun weighing my family’s comfort against the impending electric bill. We have air conditioning in the car too, though I hate to use it for short trips around town. There are my FWPs (friends with pools, remember them?) and my FWBS (friends with beach stickers) and that helps too. But for one day, I’d like to not have to strategize about how to stay cool in extreme heat. I’d like to weed my perennial bed, sleep with the windows open and mow the lawn without dropping dead from heatstroke.

I’m conflicted on hot, sunny days. A part of me feels that my kids and I should be outside enjoying the sunshine. After all, before we know it, there will be frigid temperatures and bitterly cold winds (though not soon enough, in my opinion). But when its 90 degrees with high humidity, all I want to do is hunker down inside my house, the mall or a movie theater and wait for the heat to break.

Last week we had a cool, rainy day. It was still quite humid, but the temperature never rose above 80. It was wonderful to wake to cloudy skies. For once there was no pressure to “…get outside and enjoy the sunny weather…” I’d forgotten what it was like to have grey clouds overhead, with no hint of blue sky. The rain did not come in a torrent, as is so often the case during summer thunderstorms. Rather, it misted and dribbled and dripped, teasing our water-starved lawns and flowers. ‘Hooray’, I thought, ‘lousy weather at last.’

And then it was gone, only to be replaced with another hot, sunny, sticky day. Sigh.
You might wonder how the Twilight Zone episode ended. As it turns out, the main character was suffering from a fever, which caused her to dream that the earth was moving closer to the sun. In true Twilight Zone fashion, the earth was in fact moving farther away from the sun. As the main character sweated through her delusion, the frigid cold snow swirled outside the window.
Sounds lovely to me.