teahouseblossom
Wednesday, July 07, 2010

      ( 12:53 AM ) teahouse
 
Heat Wave! Burning in my Heart

So this week we celebrated Independence Day in the United States. I got some projects finished at work, and I relaxed as much as I could over the weekend.

But now all of us in the Northeast have been hit with a record-breaking heat wave.

For the last couple of days, the highs in New York City have been close to 100 degrees F.

The Mayor has warned of blackouts due to pressure on the energy grid. Everyone is encouraged to stay indoors, turn off unnecessary lights, drink lots of water and make use of local cooling centers.

Having grown up in the Deep South, I can't help but feel a little strange about all of these newsworthy warnings.

Yes, I understand we all need to take precautions, but seriously, I don't remember a single heat wave from my childhood.

Is it because every single day from May to September of every year was a constant heat wave? So that elevated temperatures were nothing out of the ordinary?

I remember lounging on porches, not doing much but drinking lemonade and fanning myself for hours on end.

I remember lazily watching flies amble by, while crickets chirped as the sunset brought blessed relief from the heat.

I remember reading Harper Lee's line in To Kill a Mockingbird about a childhood spent in the South: "Ladies bathed before noon, after their three-o'clock naps, and by nightfall were like soft teacakes with frostings of sweat and sweet talcum powder."

And thinking that was the world's most perfect line of prose, for capturing it all so beautifully.
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7 comments



7 Comments:



Same thing here. We have had 100°F for about 2 weeks (which is not unusual but not extremely common either) and nobody is thinking that people need to be warned... People are just happy that summer is here at last! Staying indoors? Pah ;)

By Blogger Len, at 6:01 AM  

yeah, but we are used to being hot

hot in the summer, fall, winter and spring it's the cold that freaks us out

well okay so sometimes it freaks us out :-o

By Blogger ... Paige, at 1:20 PM  

i used to go to Scottsdale a lot. And i've been in the Summer which is kind of crazy because it's always over 100 degrees. People would say to me, "oh but i'm sure it's ok. they have a dry heat."

I was like, "uh, 100 degrees is still pretty hot, dry or wet.)

By Blogger TCho, at 5:22 PM  

Here in the Sacramento Valley, we are used to triple digit temperatures. So hitting 100s is pretty common.

I agree with you. It's not like NY's never experienced temperatures like this in the past.

By Blogger lissa, at 4:29 PM  

so you melted?

I said what about you?????

come on over and find out

By Blogger ... Paige, at 10:18 AM  

Are temps haven't been as warm yet. Only a couple of days of 100 degrees. It's stayed mostly in the 90's but it's still hot. From what I've heard, ours is a dry heat so it's not as bad. I guess.

By Blogger Jolynn, at 12:59 PM  

From Wikipedia: [Harper} Lee continued as a reservation clerk until 1958, when she devoted herself to writing. She lived a frugal life, traveling between her cold-water-only apartment in New York City and her family home in south-central Alabama to care for her father.

And she finished writing To Kill a Mockingbird when she was only 33 years old.

By Anonymous lbck, at 1:35 PM  

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THIRTYSOMETHING (!!) year old Asian American New Yorker, lawyer, amateur musician, curious girl taking a bite out of the Big Apple. Don't mess with me - I'm short and I look demure, but I carry a big purse. And I've just embarked on the journey of married life in Manhattan.


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