Most Southern kids hate the oppressive heat of late summer, but I'm always grateful for August. It's the only month of the year when Daddy will run the air conditioning. No matter if July is sweltering and September is miserable, we only get relief in August. I can sleep past 8:00 a.m. without waking up in a puddle. Thanks goodness we don't live in Florida. It's hot enough here in North Carolina.
I love falling to sleep to the gentle strains of the AC's mechanical buzz. Our home is cool for 31 blissful days, even though the summer heat lingers from late April to early October here.
I always have nightmares when it's hot at night, but Daddy hasn't quite made the connection. I wake up to the continuous chirping of the crickets, but to me it sounds like monsters outside my window, ready to feast on my flesh like zombies.
Once I woke up screaming for Daddy. There was a thunderstorm and the rain was coming in my window. I though a burglar had shoved me into a bag and tossed me in the river. I know it was just a bad dream, one of many, but my home doesn't feel safe in the summer. Something about the open windows, the stifling air, and an imagination that can't get a good night's sleep while I'm tossing and turning on sweat-soaked sheets.
I only sleep soundly in August when the windows are closed. In August I'm safe from the storms and the monsters. My nightmares take their annual vacation, at least until Daddy gets the electric bill and opens the windows again.
I'm grateful Daddy runs the heat December through February, at least.
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