the weather

brooklyn, ny

conventional wisdom has it that weather is the least interesting topic of conversation. it is thought to be a crutch against silence and ever since the people who announced it on local telecasts became more and more perky, attractive, and for some reason, prominent, the phenomenon has lost much of its luster. i put one foot in the weather-as-digested-trope camp until realizing that i do not agree with this viewpoint. at all. the climate and atmospheric conditions have dictated world history and have their footprint in everything from natural selection to skin pigmentation to the formidableness of playoff home field advantage for the green bay packers. it is anything and everything, at least to the extent that anything could be everything.

i remember one year ago when i was in mopti, mali, just south of the sahara. we hiked and biked our way into dogon country and settled into a restaurant just shy of noon and before the large spike in the day's temperature when you would kill for it to only be 100 degrees. my host directed me to a mattress and told me that we would leave around 4:00 pm, 4 hours later. i thought that he was just being considerate on my behalf, that he did not want to exhaust the white foreigner, until i saw that he and all the other locals were resting as well. july in new york has not been as hot as it was in mali, but it has sometimes not felt too far off. still, the city's reaction to it has been the entire opposite as that of my hosts.

for those that do not live here, the temperature may read less than it does in arizona or texas, but that does not take into account the urban heat island effect. greater human density equals higher temperatures than those reported on the blue screen. vertical buildings provide more surfaces to capture and absorb heat. asphalt and concrete do not respire the same as an open field. when you factor in that the area has high humidity, these are not the ideal conditions for natural human living.

the city that never sleeps, appropriately, does not siesta. rain or shine, with the mercury at zero or one hundred, there is work to be done. it is natural to see the suits strolling about amid the skyscrapers and office buildings, but there is nothing natural about homo sapien wearing more clothing when the big burning star is imposing its fiercest wrath of the year. people are hot, people are sweaty, people are working, people are miserable. the fact that it is business as usual is suggestive of the diligent character that has built this city to be the behemoth that it is. it also suggests that we are all entirely stupid. i see some shirt-and-tie wearing individuals and can't help but pity them until i think about how these are the very individuals whose greed has ruined the lives of so many. i still don't think the trade fair: they overheat through unseasonable dress in exhange for profiting from toxic assets that have a negative economic impact on billions. but i suppose it's a start.

so i find myself at least glad that my neck can breathe while summer does its damage. i have a fan trained on me at all times while i work from home and do what i can to get myself into one of the city's beautiful parks as frequently as possible. hydrate and avoid the sun by day, find myself a nice cold beverage to wash it all away by night.

so i hope you didn't mind the brief detour into the heavily traversed topic. maybe you might even have a bit more patience next time the topic turns climactic. maybe you might even find it as fascinating as i do. i leave you with one inarguable tenet: it was in this past or at least a very recent year that weather no longer became the most boring topic of conversation. the indisputable heir is anything pertaining to cell phones. if you want to show me your latest application or complain to me about your carrier's coverage, don't be offended if i turn and walk away. or do be offended. i don't care, i'm just gone.