We convinced ourselves we understood heat. After all, the Midwest is no stranger to heat. I had distinct memories of the Fourth of July after our son was born. We set up our chairs on the parking lot at a local college to watch the Fort Wayne city fireworks. The summer heat reached nearly 100 degrees when the sun was up. By the time the fireworks started, the temperatures had dipped just below 90. The only way I could be comfortable in my post-partum body with my infant son in my arms was to wear shorts and a tank top.
My husband Jeff and I thought we understood heat because we had experienced summer weeks of 90+ degree days. The year we moved into our first house in Indianapolis, our air conditioning quit during an August heat wave. It was miserable. It didn’t matter how many fans we ran in each room of the house. There wasn’t enough cool air at night to pull into the house from the outside. The humid air clung to my body as we waited for the warranty company to complete the repairs.
But nothing prepared us for the heat in Texas.
The month before we moved, we regularly checked the temperature in Fort Wayne against the current temperature in Houston. We also checked the humidity. More often than not, the humidity was higher in Fort Wayne, and so we convinced ourselves we could handle this. It wouldn’t be that big of a deal.
We moved to Houston in mid-July. Because we were still looking for a house, we spent the next six weeks living in our 30-foot travel trailer, an RV designed for camping in Indiana, not for living in Houston. It was hot, all the time. Where 100-degree heat waves were a rarity in Indiana and usually lasted less than a week, we experienced weeks on end of multiple days consistently reaching 100. We were used to the nighttime temperatures going down into the 70s, even on the worst days. Now, we were lucky if we saw the low 80s.
It was hot, so hot. We thought we knew. We thought we understood. But like John Snow, we knew nothing.
But strangely, it didn’t take us too long to acclimate to the extreme heat, or at least to learn how to tolerate it when outside and otherwise avoid it.
By the time we moved into our house, we discovered the beauty of a light breeze once the temperatures drop below 85 at night. We learned to take advantage of the early morning or evenings. When I took up running, I knew that if I didn’t get out before 9 AM, I would have to wait until after 8 PM even to attempt three miles. And I learned to accept the sweat dripping off my body once I finally got home.
Months on end of hot weather were the trade-off for not freezing during most of the winter months. At least, that’s what we told ourselves when the hot weather arrived by mid-May and didn’t leave until September. There was no break. Once it arrived, the heat didn’t go away. We wouldn’t see 70-degree temperatures again until late September or October. Even the rain didn’t give us much of a break from the sweltering heat, and by the time it cleared out, the humidity increased with the steam coming off of the hot pavement.
The only time we experienced a significant temperature break was during Hurricane Harvey, and the trade-off was not great. We would have been happy without the storm that kept us stuck inside for days. It sounds selfish and cruel, but we could get excited when hurricanes would turn right and leave the Texas Gulf Coast alone. The tropical disturbance would temporarily suck the humidity away from us as the storms built to hit other states along the Gulf. While I felt empathy for the people being battered by a new storm, I breathed a sigh of relief as I walked out my own front door and experienced slightly more comfortable runs and walks with the dogs.
And because Texas is so diverse, the heat takes on different forms in other parts of the state. We drove through West Texas on two separate summer vacations, taking us into the hot desert. Instead of oppressive humidity, we would try to stay hydrated during our overnight stops as we explored the rocks in Palo Duro or Monahans Sandhills. The hot sun baked us every time we stepped out of our truck for a pit stop. Yes, the humidity at home added a layer of discomfort, but at some point, hot is just hot.
Like many things in Texas, Texans often believe their experiences are unique to those of less fortunate souls who do not live in the Lone Star State. We frequently heard native Texans discuss how much cooler the summers must be in the Midwest when we would talk about visiting family. And it’s true that average temperatures are significantly lower. Those who have grown up in east Texas, where the humidity saturates the pores and weighs down anything that will absorb the water hanging in the air sometimes struggle to understand other places also deal with heat and humidity. We often corrected friends who compared summer humidity with other places around the country, pointing out that the humidity could often be higher for our Midwest relatives and that we were accustomed to humidity making summer miserable. Hot is hot, no matter where you live.
But the heat in Texas lasts for so long. For the first few months of the heat, we could escape to our pool, but by August the pool temperature nearly matched the air temperature. The neighborhood pool stayed cooler for longer, but it still wasn’t much of a relief in late summer. So we often hid inside where the air conditioner cranked out cool air. When the the sun went down, we would brave the mosquitoes to walk the dogs, unless it was a night when the city was spraying. On those nights, I ran away from the cloud of insecticide and prayed it would do its job so I could continue my steamy walk through our neighborhood without being bitten.
I can’t say I ever missed spring, because it felt like spring during much of the winter. But I missed fall. I missed the dry warm days and cool nights of September and October. Every September living in Houston, I eagerly awaited the first morning I would wake up to morning temperatures in the seventies, and then in October the first time I would see morning temperatures in the sixties. You can get acclimated to the heat. You do learn to cope with it, but it can be a lot. And maybe that is why we left the state for a few weeks every summer. We needed time away from home so the heat didn’t drive us away permanently. Or at least, until we decided it was time to return “home” to the Midwest.
So yes, hot is hot, and Texas seems to be better at it than most.
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Hot, hot, hot! I remember growing up in Ohio, it got hot in the summer, but it was the humidity that was the real culprit for summertime misery. Thank you for sharing Texas!
90 / 100 degrees! Now that would be something in the UK. Last year we did get to that and over. But that is not the norm. We also do not have air con! It is not normally needed! I now have portable - air cons - just in case!