COSMO AT REST

Somebody loves this weather! 

We’re told that this is not normal.  Yes, it can get hot and sticky with humidity in the summer, but not like this, they say.  And we have no reason to doubt.  Except that if you look around, and stay tuned, and indulge in a metropolis daily, you can’t help but begin to fear that it is the start of G.W. I hate to say the words out loud, it has been so bandied about and analyzed and debated to bits and even though I, for one, believe in the truth and existence of mankind’s crass and unthinking destruction of our planet’s atmosphere, that is just in my heart and mind and I am not a scientist.  Yet I have read the scientific predictions from reputable sources and they are all saying – “get used to it!”

Lets face it, where the weather is concerned, everything is more extreme these days.   The extra feet of snow that falls for longer periods and the drought that covers our own southern climes as well as parts of Africa and the flooding of the rivers and lakes and now, right here in Minnesota, and far beyond – record dew points.

I didn’t know what dew points meant when I was in California, but it seems when you measure the actual temperature and create a ratio with the humidity, you get a different number altogether and that determines what the “actual” temperature will be so that 90 degrees with a dew point of 89 degrees will probably compute as 135 degrees!  Or thereabouts.

I always equated the dew with some lovely morning mistiness that is associated with faeries and elves.  Grandma Marie even sang about a fabled garden where “the dew is still on the roses” and I got the picture that it was a very good thing, walking with Jesus and all in the dew, even though she lapsed back and forth from English to Swedish inter-verses. My Webster’s New World actually states – “anything regarded as refreshing, gently falling, pure”.

But Dew Point is our new marker and I find myself anxiously turning on the local weather report every day with Sven calmly intoning the grim news for Fergus Falls.  Today before the heat index could climb beyond endurance, I went to the garage to continue to break down and tie up the many packing boxes that have been tossed about.  This mainly so that we can park the van in the garage when the tornado approaches.  And I was surprised to find that much of the cardboard was difficult to slice through with my mat knife because it was WET!  Absolutely sopping wet.  And yet, that’s not hard to figure because I WAS SOPPING WET.  The dew point evidently has to go somewhere and it’s not necessarily on the roses.

So, yes, we are dripping and exclaiming and complaining and even in awe of what Mother Nature or even G.W. has wrought, but – you know what? – we are still happy to be here.

humidity sky