{almost} too hot

Forewarned: Almost Too Hot to Watch!
Last week-end I went to Central Florida to visit my parents. My parents are lovely, funny people who talk at the same time about completely different things. This environment is equally responsible for my love of storytelling and my total discomfort with conversations about the weather. Are we not all in this city? Do we not all feel the heat emanating from the concrete outside? Have we all, except you, had a collective concussion and lost our temporal memory. Yes, it’s summer. And, it is hot.

There are so many good things to talk about. Let’s not repeat the conversation that we had yesterday about the weather. I want to say this but usually I just nod and hope they will not ask me if it’s going to rain this week at all. For the record, I’m not a meteorologist so my guess is usually pretty bad.

My parents talk about everything with total passion. They are people with opinions and they seemed rather disappointed when my brother or I didn’t know where we stood on something. “What do you mean you don’t know? Think about it,” my mother would say {because in a totally different context} she told us that she would “not have us sign up to become morons.” We both, my brother and I, appreciate that.

So, I think about stuff but sometimes I stay in my head too long and then I wonder if I should add this new hip exercise to my routine.

What is that, you ask? That’s called Anti-Gravity Yoga. I’m simultaneously amused and disbelieving. My mother worked in the nursing field in New York and she always got slightly bullish in the winter because her work load would double. Literally. So many elderly people fall on ice patches in the winter and have to be lifted into bed. It looks like they invented this apparatus to fix the disparity between elderly folks with hip replacements and young folks with hip replacements.

It looks like an apparatus someone from the hip replacement industry sponsored in order to fill more orders. My brother, whose idea of fun is fishing quietly on a lake, has steel nerves. He will never pay anyone to hang him upside down in a silk hammock to meditate. He also has pretty sharp ideas for a 12-year-old. He told me “it’s all about determination and fear.” So, I’m taking that nugget of wisdom from the boy who used to call me Mom when our mother was out and putting it in my pouch. I’m determined and fearless!

I spent a good deal of Saturday giving my mother my fearless opinion of some of the items in her closet. We decided some things could go the thrift shop and others would be given away. She had some things in there that she had never even worn.

Among various rags and tags we found the following unbelievable couture piece. The tag read ForeWarned: Jeans Almost Too Hot to Wear. Now, several questions arose. Are they maternity pants? Because if they are, the tag line is even funnier. And if they are not maternity pants, what’s up with the stomach pouch? I just had to try them on.

And lo, we found out that the pants were not only hot but they also turned me into the most enthusiastic cast member of a dinner-theatre company. Watch and Delight.

Too Hot for Shoes
These are the real Zara lounge pants that I wore that day for dinner on the porch. And this is our amazing pool. My parents are lucky they have pool and it is my duty as their young responsible daughter to  call them every day to harangue them about getting in the pool for half an hour of exercise. So while I was home we did a lot of pool time and walking in the heat.

Too Hot to be be asking “How Clean is this Water?”

My brother’s friends accompanied us to Rainbow Springs and I felt rather youthful hanging out with a group of 12-year-olds. Rainbow Springs is a National Park. There were no rainbows but there were lovely springs and brackish water where you could canoe or swim. It was nice taking them to a very bad Chinese restaurant and having them make good fun of it. I like children with a healthy sense of humor! We decided the chicken maybe had no organic material in it all at and so should not be eaten.

I also had the wonderful opportunity of discussing career paths with these youngsters. Some people like to talk to current colleagues or maybe read Brazen Careerist for advice. I like to talk to a group of intelligent 12-year-olds. Kids will be totally honest with you and their untarnished confidence in their dreams is, to me, exhilarating. For instance, my brother and I discussed Richard Branson, the owner of Virgin America and many other things that fly. Little bro wants to be an engineer (Maybe build airplanes or shuttles for NASA, he said.) His friend, John, told me he wanted to be a farmer. “I love farm country,” he drawled without cynism. He’s undecided between exotic or heirlooms as his main crop but he’s sure it’s going to be a fruit and dairy farm. This he told me on the way to the Chinese restaurant when I was pretty hungry so I confess I did eat some of the artificial chicken; I hope I don’t grow an extra finger.

John also knew who Johnny Cash was. We listened to NPR on the car radio. They were broadcasting an interview with Cash’s daughter, Roseanne, who had produced a new album inspired by her dad.

Florida was fantastic. What I love best about it are the people. Seriously. We walked 10 minutes to go shake hands with someone my mother called ” a neighbor friend.” I don’t even know the name of the man who lives across the hall from me in Washington, DC. This makes me feel I’ve fallen away from my values. My parents and her neighbor friends who own various fruit trees will also exchange fruits in peak season. There was a woman, who without a trace of shame would bring over a cardboard box, to carry off bunches of grapefruit from our backyard. That’s what it means to be a good neighbor! My mother was delighted.

I am going to attempt to make eye contact with people in the elevator in my apartment building. I hope no one uses pepper spray on me.

While I was in Florida, I also did an internet detox. I checked my email sparingly. We drank Dutch Choco Wine {It’s like Irish liqueur} sparingly and ate not so sparingly. Good times were had by all especially that performer in the Hot Pants!

Summer is not complete until you’ve worn some hot pants and dipped your toes into some salty water!