The Promise of Summer

It's getting hot in here.

The last time I pecked on the keys of this blog was another time indeed. We were in the thick of a fierce, toothy winter. And now a few things have happened. I got good news from my team of doctors in NY, and the summer flipped on here like a hot griddle and wiped all memory of ever being cold, wearing mittens or looking in the bottom of the closet for close-toed shoes.

A nineteenth century map of Maine that hangs on the barn-wall at our favorite, cranky Blue Hill Country Inn boasts -in antiquated style- that this state is a place of extremes. This is apt, and also one of the things I appreciate most about living here. It's not just that we "have seasons" which is the frequent lament of west-coast bound New Englanders. Even in Los Angeles, there are seasons if you pay attention to the quality of the light, the size of the strawberries at the farmer’s markets, or the current line of women's footwear. Only here, in this upper right hand corner, it really is like Frosts' Fire and Ice, and one is lonely without the promise of the other.

This weekend, we took a ferry out to Peaks Island and watched sailboats meander around the harbor. We swam in the bay, watched Prometheus fetch seaweed, drank lemonade from a ten year old girls' lemonade and chocolate chip cookie stand, slathered ourselves in spf 30, chased after Arden's oft-falling hat for fear of freckling her perfectly alabaster baby skin. We were sweating in the shade, and leaping into the always fresh (read: euphemism) waters of the Atlantic to cool ourselves off. The gestalt of that day was repeated on Sunday at Crescent Beach in Cape Elizabeth where we looked across the bay to a rough green island that could have been floating off the coast of Ireland [disclaimer: I have only been to Ireland in my mind's eye], but splashed in waters that rivaled our forays into the sea in Aigua Blava, Spain in 2008. The thermometer teetered just under 90, but the thick, humid air that only felt refreshing if you were rushing through it on a ferry boat, made you feel like you someone was hugging you all the time, and you couldn’t kick off the covers. It was weather that begged you to eat ice cream or drink something with bubbles because only bubbles can make your average beverage actually seem colder. And this weekend hasn’t been an anomaly. It’s been like this all summer long; only with a.c. has the apartment been tolerable, but even as I use the word intolerable, I know I am being an unreliable narrator. I love to complain about the heat. Because it’s not even complaint really: it’s a respectful acknowledgment of heat. And just as I am sad when the power comes flickering back on after a storm, or when the snow storm peters out, I too feel a subtle let down when the heat wave breaks, and we go back to the standard 73 and sunny with a slight breeze, like it though I do. Hot summers remind me of childhood, when the only relief was sleeping naked on top of the sheets, a fan oscillating at the foot of the bed blasting you with only slightly cooler air. Hot summer nights aren't good for sleeping in, but they are great for being awake in. Though the days make me lazy, the nights are agitating enough to get the mind beetling and bouncing around.

And to think that my last few posts on this blog chronicled the vicious attack of the flesh if a piece of skin wasn't covered in sufficient layers of sheep-product. Maybe the extremes are so wonderful because it allows you in effect to move without moving. Even if you stay where you are, the landscape takes you to another place entirely. I can go from St. Barthes to Reykjavik without changing my address labels. For those of us who have both the appreciation for a peripatetic lifestyle, as well as the nesting instincts like I do, the meteorological extremes allow us to reinvent the visual texture of our lives without having to strip to one's skivvies for a TSA officer. If nothing looks the same season to season, we can actually see it again, as opposed to having it disappear from our field of consciousness.

I am sure there are good arguments out there for the temperate climate. You don't have to waste time buying clothes for all seasons. You can always dine al fresco. You never have to complain about digging your car out of a snowbank. It's hard to argue with "it's always beautiful." But I think I just did.