Summertime heat

By Christine Tailer
HCP columnist

It has been rather hot of late. That might even be a bit of an understatement. It has been so hot that I can sit in the shade and watch moisture beading up on my forearm. 

It doesn't matter if I've been out in the sun and working hard, or riding my zero turn and cutting down what is left of the dry garden, or swinging leisurely in the shade of the pine tree. My body just seems to continuously exude moisture.

Of course, I wear a broad-brimmed hat when I am outside, but the headband quickly turns into a sopping ribbon across my forehead. In time, salty droplets slide down into my eyes, and my hair is as wet as though I had just washed it, but I must wear the hat. 

My dermatologist advises that I really should wear a long-sleeved shirt as well, but I have foregone that recommendation, and slather on sunscreen instead. Even the sunscreen feels like a heavy blanket on my skin, though to my mind, the sunscreen is not as oppressive as the long-sleeved shirt.

I intended to head down the hill and weed the greenhouse floor, but when I opened the greenhouse door, I felt my breath catch in my chest. The temperature gauge read a toasty 120 degrees.

I quickly stepped back outside. The mere 96-degree air suddenly felt bearable. Perhaps I had just discovered a new way to cope with the summer’s heat.  

I turned from the greenhouse and walked across the gravel driveway to the woodshop. I opened the shop door, entered, slid open each window, and turned on the fan. I stepped back outside and found a shady spot on the upper side of the pasture to sit and wait for the shop to cool down. 

Not a breath of air stirred the leaves on the hillside behind me. No birds called. The dry creek made not a sound. The valley was still. I slowed my breath and felt wrapped in the rare silence. I began to feel vaguely comfortable.

I rose and stepped back into my woodshop. It was still unbearably hot, and then a brilliant thought occurred to me. I picked up a small wooden box that I had been working on and turned it over in my hands. All that remained for me to do was decorated it and rub it down with tung oil. I gathered up my wood burning tools and the oil, and headed back up the hill to the cabin.

By the time I reached the top of the hill, I was once again covered in salty seepage, but the instant I opened the door and stepped into the basement, I was wrapped in its cool air. I set the box and tools down on my workbench, and looked down to find the puppy dog contentedly lying on the cement floor, stretched out to her full length. 

"You are a wise little dog," I told her. She looked up at me with her puppy dog eyes. She did not move, not nary a muscle.

I took off my hat, splashed water from the basement sink across my face, and then I comfortably settled down at my workbench to decorate the little box. Weeding the greenhouse and those other hot things that I might have done, could easily wait until another day. The puppy was quite right. The basement was the place to be, at least until evening, when we might decide to venture out for a walk along the dry creek.

Christine Tailer is an attorney and former city dweller who moved several years ago, with her husband, Greg, to an off-grid farm in Ohio south-central Ohio. Visit them on the web at straightcreekvalleyfarm.com. 

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