"An Easy Hot Topic for All to Ponder" - Time Out #99

Need an ice breaker during the next silent moment between you and a total stranger?

How about talking about the weather?

Remember the famous country western song, those songs that forever tell stories, with the phrase "old men talk about the weather, and old women talk about old men".

Nothing, well almost nothing, can get people started chatting in Our State and Our Town easier than bringing up the topic of the Oklahoma weather.

Quickly recall the saying "if you don't like the current weather, just wait 5 minutes, and it will change". I know I altered the famous line a little, but we all know the meaning of it.

However, that is NOT likely this month or next, hardy Okie people.

Oklahoma summer has descended upon us like a blanket. A VERY hot/humid blanket for sure, I might say.

It seems like I have a very short memory, even though my hair is thin and more white than gray.

I can't remember it has been this uncomfortable in years past, but then again, I've only lived in Our Town since 1953.

Reality and history tells me it has been hotter than hot here many times in the past. How hot you ask? Hot enough to fry that proverbial egg on the proverbial sidewalk in short order style.

Again, my left brain tells me fall and cooler weather is just a few short months away, but my right brain says every day seems like a repeat of the previous day; hot in the morning, real hot in the early afternoon, incredibly hot in the late afternoon, tolerably hot in the early evening, and uncomfortably hot during sleeping hours. It is then we keep our bedroom air conditioning cranked way down at night, to a frigid level some might say, but that's how bride, Debbie, and I prefer it.

Which brings me to expand on that magical invention of air conditioning (a/c).

Could there be any human-made invention more wonderful in Our State this time of year than a/c?

Rewind to the 1950's in Our Town with me, and let's revisit the human cooling devices available to us during those sizzling summer weather months. There were but a few, as I remember. Let's start with the hand held fans.

These little, mostly free with local advertising businesses supplying them, fans could move a little hot air by the person vigorously waving them, but in that absolute heat, any human effort was just that, effort. Next, we advance to electric fans. Noisy and cumbersome, however, they were wonderful, if you had nothing else. The extra special ones had rotating arms attached to them so the breezes created could actually circulate over a broad, semicircular area to provide meaningful air movement. If one really wanted to get cleaver, you could add a container of ice cubes in front of the fan to give the air a simulated arctic effect.

Getting much larger in the fan category, was the attic fan. This huge device was installed in a home's ceiling, and was usually turned on in the evening to bring the "cooler" (remember, only slightly, as previously stated) night air through the attic, through our bedroom windows, and, ultimately, across our beds, as we rested. Of course, it also brought plenty of various nighttime plant pollen that aggravated our respiratory allergies. We didn't really care about the sneezing, however, as long as we were cooler, as I vaguely remember.

Lastly, is the granddaddy of them all, the legendary swamp cooler.

What is that, says the under-50 reader crowd??

A swamp cooler is a slang term for a gigantic electric-operated metal box that sits in a window, is extremely noisy, and works by dripping water through a musty fabric-type filter, and blowing the water-filled air out into the room to cool off any living thing in the immediate area. One of these certainly cooled me off for many of my formative years in our West 4th & South Walnut home. Again, they are air- allergy nightmare, though, but, again, who cared, as long as it cooled us off?

So, when a/c hit the scene in Our Town in the early-mid 1950's, I was absolutely hooked to the summertime motion picture scene. Every Saturday, I would find myself at a double-feature cartoon movie for a dime in one of our 4 downtown theaters, eating a big box of dime popcorn, and drinking a nickel soft drink. By far, the biggest treat of these outings, however, was the ice cold "refrigerated air" the movies provided for me and my buddies to enjoy. I always remember a blast of hot air hitting me in my face as I would walk outside the show after several hours inside, and quickly jump on my 20" bike to peddle home, hoping to get an air current going around me, Maybe, just maybe, I'd enjoy a double treat a few summer weeks by also getting to cool off in my favorite watering hole, Crystal Plunge, for lots of swimming fun with my friends.

That was then, and this is now.

Yes, it was hot then, and it's hot now.

Some things never change during a summer in Our Town.