Every once in a while I sit down to write and the topic that comes to mind feels familiar—as if I’ve already written about it. Today is one of those days. Here, I drop in a previous musing, written nearly a year ago to the day—but with fresh flower garden photos. With consistent watering, the flowers are flourishing in this humid heat, weathering it better than I am. Take a walk in my garden after my midsummer reflection…
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I’ve always said I love the four seasons and would find it hard living somewhere without four distinct seasons. If I look a bit deeper, what I really like is the change of seasons: the shutting off of one and the opening of another. At nearly 54 years old, I see that the four seasons are actually splintered into subsets. About a week ago, we moved from early summer to midsummer. Despite heat and humidity of this new sub-season, I’m yearning for the outdoors: away from visual reminders of projects and chores.
Today, I’m parked on the porch, perched at the typewriter. Oh, I see my folly: I’m perched at the computer—and still wishing that I could find perfect alliteration with perched. Whether typewriter or computer falls through my fingertips, neither begin with a “p” to sit nicely with parked, porch, and perched.
Since the turn to midsummer, each morning I get a jump on the sun and water the flower beds before ten; this guarantees that I’ll be in the shade of the maples surrounding our property – not standing in the sun with water spraying from a hose and sweat dripping down from my knees. After hauling a 100-foot hose around for a half-hour to water, I return inside to where I’ve adjusted the air conditioner for what was the early morning “working-in-the-house-mode.” That has now changed to meat cooler temperature.
I’m sitting at the two-person bistro table on my porch. The tablecloths are damp from the humidity. A small rechargeable-battery operated fan sits on the table directed at my neck, which like my knees has a propensity to shed water in the humidity; I awoke at 5:12 this morning with a neck sweat. There is a breeze crossing the porch, and the ceiling fan is whirring above me where it’s securely attached to the porch roof. I rarely use this fan, so when I flipped the switch on a few minutes ago, I stood a safe distance away in the doorway watching it spin and studying how its action created a smaller rotation in the light hanging under the fan. After a minute or so, the light was still attached to the fan; I have faith that the light was engineered so as to move with the fan. This phenomenon must be related to the way skyscrapers are built to sway, in particular what used to be the Sears Tower in Chicago. On average it sways six inches, but it could sway—if need be—up to three feet. Like heat exchangers, radio waves, and airplanes, I accept these beasts’ ways although I don’t fully understand the physics.
We have air-conditioning in the house. When we added onto the house in 2012, the old air vents in the bedrooms were connected to the new vents in the master bathroom and bedroom. When the air comes on, the sound in all of the rooms in the new addition sounds like we are about to set sail on a continental trade wind—those dry, hot prevailing land winds. On an island, where the necessity for full clothing coverage is diminished, the maritime trade winds are wetter but still warm, strong, and prevailing. Given the humidity outside, I imagine we are sailing on the latter—while still having to dress as if we are on land.
The thermostat for the second story where the bedrooms are is in the hallway outside our sons’ small 1880-circa bedrooms. Down the hallway eight feet and around the corner is the sailboat on-high in the master bedroom. If the thermostat is set at what might seem to be a comfortable 72 degrees, the old ducts halt air flow giving way to the streamlined ducts in the new part. So while the thermostat dutifully holds the hallway at 72 degrees, the new 2012-circa bathroom, located three corners away, drops to 66, perhaps 64 degrees. “Houston, we have a problem” says no one, for they fear the wrath of a women whose neck and knees sweat. (An alliteration by sound if not by letters… so comforting.)
I sat down on the porch thinking I would be writing about green beans. I thought after twenty years that topic might finally be ready to hit the paper. This proves yet again that I’m a “pantser” and not a planner; a realization I came to only in my recent writing years. Yet I will not go there now as there is a future piece reserved just for that topic—when deemed ready.
Today is reserved for one of my evergreen topics: hot, humid, midsummer days. I will leave you on the edge of your seat for those percolating essays on green beans and being a pantser. On the edge of the seat, like where I’m sitting—where the water dripping down my back, having previously glued my shirt to a chair cushion, has a chance to dry up with the various winds blowing out and about.
On the other hand, the flowers are looking sublime. I can make them happy in this heat with my personal gardening therapy. They are marching through their summer blooms, ebbing and flowing as they should.
