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No Air in North Park, Stand in Someone Else's Doorway

It's hot. Like head-in-the-oven hot. And only today did I walk through my apartment courtyard and think, when I go into my non air-conditioned apartment, I might not immediately start sweating. I might not be instantly suffocated by the pent up heat enveloping me. And, fortunately, I was right. But for the past week and a half or so, it's been nearly unbearable during daylight hours to be a resident of my one-bedroom apartment.

Did I tell you that when I moved here that I automatically assumed that my apartment had central air? Coming from Kansas where the summer temps are excruciating sometimes topping 100 plus degrees with humidity, central air is a given. It's a pure struggle to be without. But not in perfect weather San Diego where the temperatures only see 80, sometimes 90 degrees. That's nothing compared to the heatwave of the rest of the country. Not so if that 80 degrees follows you inside your home and stays with you wherever you walk, whatever you do; it's you and 80-90 degree weather with no cool air to be found.

The first time I went to turn on my "air-conditioner," I quickly learned that I only have heat. I have a furnace for the oh-so-cold (give me a break) temps that San Diego dips to in the winter, but not any air for the skyrocketing temperatures of a closed in apartment that never gets quite as cool as it does outside.

Heat and I are not friends. I have woken up crying from being too hot. Not yet since I've lived here, but I'm not ruling it out from happening. I took three showers in one day over the weekend to steal but a few moments of cold-water-only bliss.

I start sweating thinking about how hot things are going to be, but what I have to remember and is my unofficial motto in life...it could be worse. Did I tell you that when I moved into this apartment that one of the movers gave me his fan. As in, a small box fan that he had in his moving truck and brought it in to give to me for free. He was forecasting something that I did not yet know. But even three fans later, it still can't get as cool as good old-fashioned central air-conditioning. I will linger longer in the cool zone of the library, plan three-hour dinners with friends just so I can stay in someone else's air a little bit longer.

Due to my sheer willpower, I believe the heat will break. That it will be but a memory that I will quickly forget its cruelty and I will embrace the perfect weather San Diego brings to me the majority of the year. I will rejoice in a $20 utilities bill and limit my showers back to just one per day. They say that San Diego doesn't have seasons, but I beg to differ. Right after the weeks of heat that melts my face and allows me to lose five pounds of sweat a day, I will welcome in the crisp air of fall. It's right on the horizon, beyond the marine layer, waiting to circle in and makes it rounds through my humble apartment. And, I will be happy once more.

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It's hot. Like head-in-the-oven hot. And only today did I walk through my apartment courtyard and think, when I go into my non air-conditioned apartment, I might not immediately start sweating. I might not be instantly suffocated by the pent up heat enveloping me. And, fortunately, I was right. But for the past week and a half or so, it's been nearly unbearable during daylight hours to be a resident of my one-bedroom apartment.

Did I tell you that when I moved here that I automatically assumed that my apartment had central air? Coming from Kansas where the summer temps are excruciating sometimes topping 100 plus degrees with humidity, central air is a given. It's a pure struggle to be without. But not in perfect weather San Diego where the temperatures only see 80, sometimes 90 degrees. That's nothing compared to the heatwave of the rest of the country. Not so if that 80 degrees follows you inside your home and stays with you wherever you walk, whatever you do; it's you and 80-90 degree weather with no cool air to be found.

The first time I went to turn on my "air-conditioner," I quickly learned that I only have heat. I have a furnace for the oh-so-cold (give me a break) temps that San Diego dips to in the winter, but not any air for the skyrocketing temperatures of a closed in apartment that never gets quite as cool as it does outside.

Heat and I are not friends. I have woken up crying from being too hot. Not yet since I've lived here, but I'm not ruling it out from happening. I took three showers in one day over the weekend to steal but a few moments of cold-water-only bliss.

I start sweating thinking about how hot things are going to be, but what I have to remember and is my unofficial motto in life...it could be worse. Did I tell you that when I moved into this apartment that one of the movers gave me his fan. As in, a small box fan that he had in his moving truck and brought it in to give to me for free. He was forecasting something that I did not yet know. But even three fans later, it still can't get as cool as good old-fashioned central air-conditioning. I will linger longer in the cool zone of the library, plan three-hour dinners with friends just so I can stay in someone else's air a little bit longer.

Due to my sheer willpower, I believe the heat will break. That it will be but a memory that I will quickly forget its cruelty and I will embrace the perfect weather San Diego brings to me the majority of the year. I will rejoice in a $20 utilities bill and limit my showers back to just one per day. They say that San Diego doesn't have seasons, but I beg to differ. Right after the weeks of heat that melts my face and allows me to lose five pounds of sweat a day, I will welcome in the crisp air of fall. It's right on the horizon, beyond the marine layer, waiting to circle in and makes it rounds through my humble apartment. And, I will be happy once more.

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