Societal Cold Front

One of the less enviable things about the weather here in New Home is the humidity.  I did not grow up in it and so have never really gotten used to it as would someone that has always dwelt in this outdoor sauna setting.  It is no fun:  disincentivizing for working outside, hard on wooden structures, and just plain unpleasant to be in - the fact of being moist the whole time you are out and about is not something to persuade anyone to move into it.

The worst are the cloudy humid days.  The clouds do not just add to the humidity, they seem to hold it in, pressing down all with a grey, wet hand that can make the air almost palpable as a substance.  It hands, still and ominous.

Yet surprisingly, these can be the most endurable of days.  Why?  Because often times I know that a cold front is on its heels.

Cold fronts are not quiet arrivals here; they come with a rush of wind and thrashing of trees and leaves and trash being whipped about.  Sometimes they announce their arrival with a howl and boom and other times they simply, suddenly appear.  But there is no mistaking their arrival - or the result.

Rain.

Hard Rain.  Rain that can come down in sheets and give rise to flash floods, that creates puddles in the front and moves the shredded bark out of its borders and into the sidewalk.  Rain that pours into the cracks of the dry earth but never seems to fill them up.  Rain that brings the bursting lightning and blasting thunder that shakes the house.

The humidity is what it feels like to be alive now.

There is a low, throbbing, background rage.  You can hear it if you listen closely - not to words and actions but rather as a distant murmur in the background.  You can feel it overlaying every element of society, every element of our day.  You can see it in the actions and words all around.  It presses down on us like the cloud cover, keeping everything inside and under pressure, until the sweat drips down our brows and the clothes stick to us in large, brown patches.

But the Cold Front is coming.  I do not know when.  I cannot say how.  But I can hear it on the outskirts of the North in my soul, rolling like a speeding train over the Great Plains, bending wheat and trees to its blast, hurtling towards a hot, humid rage.

And when it comes, the torrential rain will drown us, the blistering lightning will blind us, the booming thunder will deafen us.

And all will say "We never saw it coming".