A History of Heat

 

The heat has finally broken. Not that I’ve been suffering unduly, living as I now do in the blessed world of air conditioning. My Guy and I are endlessly fascinated by recounting to each other all those years we lived without it, and not just in our childhoods. Our first house – a 1920s Dutch colonial – sat under massive oaks in a city lot. They helped a little, I suppose (except for the carpenter ants that fell from them onto our roof), but in the summer I often used to wish the entire back of the house could be hinged up like a dollhouse.

          Twenty years later we moved to a house in the small town outside of the city where we now live. Still lots of trees, but still no air conditioning. After several steamy summers we finally acquired a couple of window units. Better but spotty.

          Twenty years after that and we’re two miles down the road in condoland with central air. Magical, magical.

          And this is just Massachusetts people, not my childhood homes in Virginia and Oklahoma.

          Actually, I earned these golden years of cooling when I think about our first year of marriage when My Guy was at Ft. Benning in Columbus, GA for Officer Candidate School.

He was on base and I was in a furnished (hah!) “garden” apartment, which meant linoleum floors, huge black beetle-like bugs that flew across the room at the speed of light, and shaking out my shoes each morning.

          I was eight months pregnant, it was June, and you guessed it, no air conditioning. It's amazing our daughter didn't end up pink with black polka dots. I spent the final month of pregnancy eating watermelon and reading murder mysteries while sitting no more that one foot away from one of our very first purchases- a giant box fan.

Heat and upcoming travels

 

The heat got the neighbor's "fried egg" 
tree off to an early start. 

Tuesday was predicted to be the start of mind-searing heat – 100 degrees - and what did I do? I hopped in my car and went off to play golf. Not the smartest thing in the world, but we were out there at 8:30 and rode around in carts.

Nope, still hot. So hot it reminded me of Robin Williams’ lines about the heat in Good Morning Vietnam. Not a leaf moved, not a cloud in the sky. After the third hole, I was done. Poke me with a fork, done. Although we soldiered on to the 9th hole.

The rest of the day improved after a shower and sequestering myself in air conditioning with friends.

 

I must have still been recovering from Tuesday, because yesterday – after yoga and watering the plants outside – was a stay inside kind of day. Good thing, since it was another 99 degree-er. Laundry, making cookies to take to daughter and grandkids this weekend, and packing. We’ll only be gone for a couple of days, but figuring out what to wear took thought. The weather will cool off markedly on Friday and it’s hard to think jeans when your brain is still in shorts mode.

 

It'll be quite the weekend. Tall son and his sweet wife and even sweeter twin girls are traveling from Rhode Island to stay over at our welcoming daughter’s in the beautiful hills of New Jersey. They’ll stay the weekend and then move on for some city time in NYC. Our two college grandsons will also be in attendance with relevant girl friends, and of course the high schooler third boy.

Family reunion! This usually only happens at our place for Christmas.

From hot dogs to toilet plungers

 

         In the interest of continuing to grab the goodness of a Massachusetts summer before the tropical heat had fully gotten its shoes under the bed, we took off for another late lunch.

The Great Outdoors

 

Yesterday was a day to be outside, a day of mid-70s temps and downright dramatic winds. When you put aside the knowledge that those winds were blowing in a sledgehammer heat wave, you could really enjoy it.

Random observations/discoveries

 

Thank heaven I’m a relatively tidy person. Maybe not a dust-the-vents-every-week kind of cleaner, but the bed is always made, towels always hung up.

Running Amok

 

We seem to be entering a new phase.

Last week the grocery store had lobsters on sale. After discussion with My Guy, we decided to go crazy. I called up to order two to be steamed and ready for pick-up. Except at the last minute I had a “what the hell” moment and asked for the poundage above the chicken lobsters.

It all comes together

 

Do you remember ever being very little and squatting by mud, mixing in twigs or leaves to create mud patties?

          I remember being about eight and discovering an old chemistry set in our basement in Virginia. It was pretty sparse, and I have no idea who it once belonged to (a misguided gift for my older sister?), but it did have a few test tubes and mysterious ingredients to mix together. Very cool. Although I never did produce any results, never mind blow up the house.

          Due to general familial disfunction, I never had those Hallmark moments at my mother or grandmother’s elbows in the kitchen, but I’ve always been drawn to cooking. I mean, who wouldn’t be if you can stir up your own chocolate chip cookies?

          As a late teen, while visiting my grandfather after my grandmother had died, I fixed several meals for him. Not that I was exactly accomplished. The baking powder biscuits made with baking soda by mistake, which meant they tasted like soap. My sainted Grampy ate them anyway. Or the scalloped oysters that he said were wonderful. I later learned that he was allergic to oysters.  

          So many cooking stories.

Columbus, Georgia, dead of summer, no AC. My in-laws down from Massachusetts to see my husband of barely a year graduate from Officer’s Candidate School. I made a meatloaf the day before and almost poisoned everyone. Fortunately, as it cooked the smell from the oven made it obvious that we’d better stick to just the vegetables for dinner.

          But the years went by and I did figure out how to cut up a chicken, make bread, roll pie crust.

Last night: pork stroganoff on spinach fettucine

  

        Maybe it’s a control thing. Being able to

  choose anything in the world, combining the

  ingredients, and then a result you can eat.

        What’s not to like?