takgoti

Favorite Photo of the Moment

Where the hell has this month gone? I logged onto tumblr thinking it’s only been a few days, maybe a week, since I last posted and the internet was all, “Ha HA! More like two weeks!” July is flying by at the speed of a cheetah with its ass on fire and it’s all I can do to hang on.

So, given my delinquency I’m going to go ahead and post another picture up here. This was taken out on the deck during the week that Cyrus and Sasa stayed over at my house because their air conditioning was blown.

For those who have not suffered through a summer on the east coast before, you should know that things don’t just get hot out here. They get humid. The difference between a dry summer and a humid summer is the difference between sweating through your tank top and sweating through your tank top whilst sitting in tepid bath water. Air conditioning isn’t a luxury; it’s a necessity.

Unlike the considerably more temperate west coast, things don’t cool off here at night. The dewpoint hovers somewhere around the 10,000,000 mark and so far as I’m concerned, that moisture heats up throughout the day and then emits the absorbed heat ALL NIGHT LONG. In the same way that wind chill can make a day go from cold to I’m-so-numb-right-now-you-could-punch-me-in-the-face-and-I-wouldn’t-feel-a-thing, humidity can give you this sticky, I’m-sweating-without-sweating feeling even though the thermometer says it’s only 85 degrees outside. And this is what it’s like just south of the Mason Dixon line. I cry tears of perspiration for our neighbors further south.

The point of all this weather-ranting is that when we get a nice evening in Virginia, we carpe noctem the shit out of it. Deck furniture gets dusted off, grill covers are removed, and even the most timid summer dwellers are sipping beverages of choice outdoors.

We were graced with such a night shortly into what would turn into a week of house-guesting whilst Cyrus and Sasa waited for the air conditioning guy to come around and make their house suitable for human life again. So, we lit some candles, poured some wine, brought my iPod dock outside, and set up their hookah on the deck.

I love these nights. Comfortably warm with a light breeze, glowing lights softly splashing across faces, and laughter drifting into the trees as friends kick back and appreciate each others’ company. It’s taken me a while to get accustomed to the humidity out here [twenty-six years, actually], but it’s still these nights that I will carry with me. When time suspends itself and the warmth gently caresses your skin. When everything is at peace and the blackness of the night offers a void of possibility instead of uncertainty.