Summer Heat

Brock and I grew up in Bakersfield.

We are the swamp cooler generation.

We thought summertime everywhere was supposed to be really hot.

There was a reason we called Bakersfield, “Bako.”

Walking barefoot from our house to a friend’s swimming pool I blistered my feet.

Getting into a car was like climbing into an oven, you had to put a towel on the seat.

After I learned to read, my favorite place to be was in the Oildale library across from Standard school. It had a giant, rattling swamp cooler blowing a semi-cool wind through the kid’s section. I read through the Hardy boys and Nancy Drew with the wind in my face.

I have so many wonderful memories from those days.

But yes, it was so very hot.

“But it’s a dry heat,” my Ohio born mama said (always making the best of it).

How did you cope with hot summer days when you were a kid?