Turn it Up / Turn it Down

Here’s the thing about air conditioning: I’m not normally a fan of A/C blowing my face into frozen oblivion, but when the thermometer outside goes over 80, I kind of need it on. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t need it cranked to “Blizzard”. In fact, it annoys the hell out of me when I have to wear a sweater and a scarf in July at my desk because the building’s A/C is set to “Frozen Tundra”, and people are still fanning themselves. No, that actually really pisses me off. But I DO want to be comfortable and not feel the sweat trickle between by boobs.

M on the other hand has an almost exorcist-like aversion to A/C, no matter how close to the sun it feels. He is so tropical one might expect to hear congas when he walks by. He is not even a fan of… FANS. “My chest!” he wheezes, clutching said chest like a 90-year old. So although he graciously “allows” us the luxury of some A/C air during the day in the summer, at night, he prefers open windows and a thin sheet. Many a night I have tossed and turned, trying to find comfort somewhere inside the haze of heat hovering in our bedroom, MY chest wet from heatstroke. But he always wins out because we wouldn’t want him to catch cold now would we?

However.

It has been a billion degrees here every day for the past week. The bunnies in my backyard seem to have lost their spunk, weakly hopping by; their little cotton tails wilted and even a little charred.

The park across the street has been a ghost town; the swings ominously empty and still, the slide too boiling burning blazing hot to even touch. The basketball court has that little wavy mirage thing happening over it, and there isn’t a single playah flinging his sweat across the court.

In short: It’s hot. Damn hot.

Because of this, I do feel it is a reasonable expectation to have the A/C on day AND night. I mean, is there anything worse than trying to sleep in wet sheets? Is there anything worse than feeling dehydrated in your dreams? Is there anything worse than waking up with heatstroke?

Because even the Scary News People have warned us that it is probably too hot to live, Mr. Tropical has caved, and the A/C has been blowin’ us to sleep every night this week. But he seems to have come down with some sort of strange ailment brought on by the continual hum of that A/C. He has an A/C-induced cough, and he feels weak and crabby, and he might even be close to collapse from some sort of undetected A/C pneumonia. I, on the other hand, have thoroughly enjoyed snuggling down into the comforter, feeling the cool fake breeze on my skin, waking up dry and rested.

Hey, it’s what marriage is all about! Compromise! Today his pneumonia, tomorrow my heatstroke!

~Patti