Today is REALLY hot (about 95 degrees!) and our air conditioning is out of commission until the repair man can visit us next week. I keep thinking how this would have been the norm when my mother was young (except for the incredibly hot laptop on my legs!)
My Mom has told me stories about how they used to take their beds outside to sleep when it was hot. (Right now, that’s sounding pretty good to me!) There’s even a mention of sleeping outside in the booklet of memories from my Grandmother. She remembered that in 1936 when my oldest uncle was born, it was a very hot summer and they slept outside most of the summer. When my mother was growing up, their house had an alley next to it AND behind it. The siblings would dare each other to sleep close to the alley because they were convinced that one of the neighbors was “crazy” and would take you if you got too close. When she would go to summer church camp, all of the campers would take their cots onto the 2nd floor patio to catch the breeze!
I can remember being in hot church services as a youngster watching all of the ladies fanning with cardboard fans similar to this one. It seems to me that they were donated by a local funeral home, but I could be wrong. I also remember seeing the large window fans running, but they would all be pointed out. That frustrated me to no end! Of course, now I understand that the goal was to remove the hot air that collected up near the ceiling, but you couldn’t convince me of that back then!
Did I mention that it’s hot??
