Keep the Coffee Comimg

Yesterday was a success. My car has gas, the trash is gone and my larder has been replenished. The dump was hell on Earth. In the winter it is the Russian steppes, but in the summer the sun beats down and the heat mirage ripples across the sand. I was so excited to get home into the cool house.

Today is already hot at 84°, and the humidity makes it worse. We have had sun then clouds then sun again. Right now the clouds are back. Thunder showers are predicted, but I have my doubts. The storms seem to miss the Cape.

When I was a kid, summers stretched out in front of me, seemingly endless. I found something to do every day. I wasn’t ever bored. Even if I was stuck inside by a storm, I was busy reading or playing in the cellar. I never saw the time pass. It just did.

I’ve always liked roller coasters. Nothing beats the anticipation and excitement of rolling up that first long hill knowing what was coming. The downhill always took my breath away. When I was a kid, the roller coasters were wooden. I remember the sounds of them on the tracks, the creaking and groaning. We had no seatbelts so we were tossed from one side to the other. From the roads, from a bit away, you could see the highest hills of the coasters at Revere Beach and Nantasket. Going home from my grandparents’ house, I could see just a small peek (peak too) of the very top of the River Beach coaster. My eighth grade trip was to Nantasket. I rode the coaster many times with my friend Jimmy. When I was in high school, we sometimes went to Revere Beach just for the food and the rides, especially the coaster. When I was much older, my mother and I vacationed in Williamsburg and stopped at Busch Gardens on our way home. I rode the looping coaster. I just couldn’t resist. My mother watched. Facing the ground was as scary as anything but sometimes, like this, fear is part of the fun of the ride.

I don’t do well on rides which go in circles, speedy circles, on tracks. I remember one trip to the Barnstable Fair and riding the sort of Tilt o Whirl except the cars were covered. I got off and got sick. As I said, I don’t do well on speedy circle rides. Merry-go-rounds, though, are perfect.

Again? She’s doing it again? Yup, I am taking another day off but not to loll. I have several errands: Agway, because the dogs demand food every day, the dump as the number of trash bags is beginning to set a new record, the gas station as my car is running on fumes and Ring as my larder needs a few essentials like bread and cream. There also are some household chores: vacuuming as the tumbleweeds fly in front of me when I walk to the kitchen and dusting but only in those spots where I can write my name in the dust.

The temperature is already 84°. My air conditioner is blasting. The dogs are sleeping. Nala is even snoring. A dog’s life looks good from here.

Talk to you tomorrow.

The first thing I did when I woke up this morning was turn on the air conditioner. The house was already hot. The high today will be in the mid 80’s, but the humidity will make it feel hotter. The sky is cloudy, but none are rain clouds. There is a breeze which stirs the hot air and sometimes rings the chimes. All of that makes today a stay home day to luxuriate in the coolness of the house.

When I was a kid, I never minded the heat. It stopped nothing. Sometimes I even walked to and from the pool, from one end of town to the other. Back then it was only a dime to enter, and I had to wear a bathing cap. I was gone most of the day.

No one’s house had air conditioning when I growing up. A fan was the only inside relief. “Hot enough for you?” was rhetorical.

Where I lived in Ghana got the highest temperatures. During the dry season, over 100° was common. I hadn’t ever lived before then where it got so hot. That it was dry mitigated the heat but not enough, but I didn’t complain too much. It was just happenstance. I did take longer showers in the cold water. I went to bed still wet so the air cooled me enough so I could fall asleep.

My summer outfit when I was young was shorts, a blouse, sometimes sleeveless, and sneakers, originally white sneakers, and socks. The only deviation from that was my Sunday, go to church, dress. I wore shorty pajamas to bed, a night time replica of my daytime ensemble. My mother kept a pitcher of Zarex in the fridge. She did make dinner as my father liked his meat and potatoes. The table in the kitchen was against the wall on one side and the stove on the other. It only had 4 chairs around it as that was all it could fit though another chair could be added at the end. My mother always stood and ate at the counter. She did that even later when in our house the table had plenty of room for all of us.

I have things to do and places to go, but they can wait until I want to do them or dare to leave the house.