High summer
Ah, summer, what power you have to make us suffer and like it.
— Russell Baker
When pondering the mystically destructive potential of summer, it's best to get your terms straight.
"Summer," by itself, means very little. It includes June, July and August, unless you're a stickler for astronomy, in which case it runs from June 21 to Sept. 23. If you're in school, it's that happy time between the end of classes and the first long walk back to the lecture hall.
It has days and nights. Some are hot, and some are brisk. Sunshine, clouds and thunderstorms blend together into a seasonal jambalaya of weather. Ants frolic on watermelons, where appropriate. Green things grow and fruit-prone plants start fruiting the hell out of the place.
Otherwise, it's sort of hard to put your finger on.
High summer is an entirely different, and far more quantifiable experience. A high summer morning drops like a wet blanket. Minutes past dawn, the sun scorches rivulets of sweat off of our arms, back and forehead. Our eyes sting from the briny water as we blink at the shimmering, heat-warped landscape.
Mid-day is deadly. We hide in our metal, air-conditioned cages. Outside, motion is foolhardy. Exercise is suicidal. Water slides — easy to mock when the temperature hovers benignly in the mere 80s — are suddenly cooler than Nelson Mandela playing go with Thom Yorke.
And then there is the evening, which is pure voodoo magic. On the sidewalks and porches of America, people get out of the house. They meet neighbors. They have conversations instead of watching television. They sweat copiously, grill up some meat and curse the heat.
As the days wear on, of course, there is a dark side.
For those without air conditioning, restful sleep is nigh impossible. Instead of 16 hours of wakefulness and 8 hours of peaceful rest, days blur together into a sleepy slurry of interrupted naps and vacant days.
Like alcohol, too much high summer destroys human inhibitions, anihilating the smudgey lines between "probable," "possible" and "probably a bad idea."
Sweat knocks out the bricks that pin back the emotional waterworks. It combines with thirst and an endlessly mounting sleep deficit to blast out the neural paths that eventually lead to mania, deep existential depression or a sense that it's time for another Pabst Blue Ribbon, regardless of how many Pabst Blue Ribbons have already been consumed.
Filth seems filthier and clutter more constricting. Rage gets more volatile. Bugs get bigger and more aggressive. Time becomes distorted — every gesture and word is registered through a matrix of molasses, and entire afternoons evaporate like a drop of rum hitting a frying pan.
Not surprisingly, high summer is a boon to artists. Driven half crazy by a lack of sleep and an environment that is surreal in its sustained cruelty and lush beauty, artists can get down to what they do best: debauchery. And the creative enterprises that inevitably follow.
High summer is also a perfect time to read; the imagination is unleashed. A sweaty, delirious, exhausted mind is a mind casting about nervously for a convenient escape.
The season is best accompanied by Otis Redding, a good window fan and a mint julep. If Otis Redding is not available, there are other musical artists that will do. If a good window fan is not available, a fortunate breeze will do. If a mint julep is not available, cold beer, fresh-brewed iced tea or real lemonade will do.
Do not listen to people who claim that water is the most refreshing beverage. That is a peanutshit idea. Water is for the unimaginative and/or joggers.
High summer doesn't come every day. Walk out to your porch, melt into a comfortable chair and treat it with respect.
— James Norton (jim@flakmag.com)
