Summer

[Author’s note:  The last of my season posts and the only one that I actually published even close to on time.]

Summer rarely sneaks in and shows up overnight in Houston.  Rather it arrives in a long drawn out process that starts some time in April or so.  The cool mornings and pleasant days slowly drift by.  We look over and study the temperature forecasts trying, hoping to detect a little dip in the weekly weather report but there’s no respite to be had and we have to admit that another Summer is on its way.

Summer in Houston is different that in other parts of the country.  The same humidity as New Orleans, the same heat as Amarillo, the same smog as L.A.  It all coalesces together into an unpleasant miasma that’s a palpable force and that lingers like an unwanted guest into late October.

There’s a good reason why Houston’s population didn’t begin to grow until the 1950’s and the advent of cheap air conditioning.  I have to wonder how many of those new Houstonians from other parts of the country that have recently emigrated here looking for jobs will fare with the Summer weather.

The sun shines mercilessly overhead.  Pleasant enough when you’re indoors and looking at it behind a wall of cold air but nasty even if you’re just walking to your car in the parking lot.

Those few clouds that dot the Texas sky will glide on through without a thought given towards rain.  Towards the end of July they will totally disappear and not return till September.

The al-Nefud desert in Saudi Arabia is nicknamed the “sun’s anvil”, but surely that nickname better applies to Houston in late August.  The pre-morning hours are hot and steamy and from there things get progressively worse.

The long summer afternoons go on interminably.  June is supposed to have the longest day of the year but the daylight hours in August keep going and going and going well into 8 or 9 at night.  In the mornings the sun roars to life in the east and in the evenings it hangs stubbornly in the western sky, blinding drivers commuting out to the western suburbs.

This is the time of year when new Houstonians either decide to tough it out or return to whence they came from.

But it’s not all about the sun and the heat in Houston.  The city has developed a modus vivendi with its climate and we have learned to function and even thrive in the weather.  We turn towards the outdoors and use the bright light to hold festivals, we have open air stadiums despite the heat are opened up to let in the light.  We adapt to our surroundings.

As August finally leaves we turn our weather eye to the coast and the coming of the Hurricane season.  That in itself is its own adventure.