If you are writing without zest, without gusto, without love, without fun, you are only half a writer. Ray Bradbury
The sky is a pale, cloudless blue and the temperatures projected to hit over 100 today. Global warming is smacking us alongside the head here and my new hobby is watering—my sprinkler is misting the side yard as I write.
Last night I attended a summer concert and sat on the lawn with friends listening to music, drinking wine, eating picnic food and watching the trees bend in the night breeze. I arrived at the park before my friends and discovered I had forgotten my chair and book, so spent fifteen minutes watching the crowd, noticing the children greeting their friends, soap bubbles floating past, people unpacking food. I’m going to drink in these balmy days, store them for the winter months of gray and rain.
I want to call your attention to a terrific essay on summer at salon.com. It’s written Oliver Broudy and it’s called Air Head and is about his dilemma with buying an air conditioner. His reason for not buying one is that it blocks out all the sensory delights of summer—the sound and heat coming in through his windows in
Here is an excerpt: “….. But I grew up on the shores of
The heat comes in and slows things. It comes in through the window where the ice tea sits brewing in the sun. There's a dog panting somewhere, behind the couch. For coolness, you'd drape yourself over the thick limb of a purple beech tree, or slide an ice cube back and forth across your forehead. You'd sneak a miniature fan into school and surrender it to a girl you liked -- a hopeful investment. The windows were open, and in the clean kitchen a fly would circle looking for some forgotten spot of honey. The most valuable commodity was a screened porch. We didn't have one, so my father built one. Then we put up a hammock. “
To read the essay go to www.salon.com/mwt/feature/2007/07/07/heat
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