Every now and then, it would be so warm that my father would take his pillow out onto the front steps. He'd lie down with his feet on the second step, knees bent. I often took my pillow out, too, and lay next to him, loving the whole idea of being out at night, resting there, looking up into our maple tree, the leaves patterned against the dark sky with here and there a star winking, or the moon floating in a haze.
Even better were the times when my father would get out the bicycle for a nighttime ride. It didn't matter that I was in my pajamas. I'd run down to the curb, and he'd help me hop up sidesaddle onto the crossbar; off we'd go, making a cool breeze as he rode. We glided into the night air down the streets of his old neighbourhood, and he'd point out the houses of where he lived as a child, where aunts and uncles lived, where friends lived and what they did or what they cooked or said. He talked about what their yards used to look like, how they used to go fishing or the nicknames they had. Sometimes he'd lapse into a silence for awhile, just thinking. Then he'd point out a tree or shrub or flower to me and tell me what it was or how to take care of it. All the while the wind was cool and I felt not the least bit tired.
When we'd get home, I would almost fall getting off the bike because my leg would have fallen asleep from sitting on that crossbar for so long. I never stumbled in front of him, and I never told him, either. I never wanted those bike rides to end.
THAT is a wonderful memory.
ReplyDeleteI don't know how we ever managed summer in our house with small high windows that didn't let in much air. We never had air conditioning until in my early teens we moved into an apartment. I'm pretty sure I thought that was heaven. LOL
Dee--I'm so glad to see you back here again and in the blog community. Thanks for reading.
DeleteIt really is something, isn't it, that we managed with just fans and tolerance. Now, AC is a necessity and not a luxury for most of us. I know I insist on it and don't feel the least bit unreasonable.
What a sweet memory, Nance! Thank you for sharing!
ReplyDeleteGigi--I'm glad you enjoyed it; thanks for being here.
DeleteWhat a beautiful memory! Thank you for sharing! Your nighttime bike rides sound like something that could be turned into a children’s picture book. Some of our favorite books are quiet, meaningful stories like the one you told. I have that on my mind because my last read to Will was ‘I Took the Moon for a Walk Last Night’.
ReplyDeleteLisa--Thank you so much! You know, I actually CAN see a children's book, page by page. I like books like that, too, and so does Theo. I think children enjoy stories that they can cozy up and absorb while imagining themselves doing some of the same things.
DeleteI love this! Those memories are so special! I remember those hot summer nights. I used to flip my pillow over, again and again, as the cooler side was on the bottom. Also, we used to sleep in the backyard in the summer, either just me and my brother, or when my cousins or friends were visiting, it could be 6 or 10 kids back there. Also, on very hot summers, my parents would even put a mattress outside for themselves and they would sleep back there too (the kids all just slept on the ground in sleeping bags; we didn't care!) I used to love looking at the stars at night with my cousins!
ReplyDeleteKyria--Thank you.
DeleteOh, gosh! The pillow flipping! I can remember doing that so frustratedly to no avail.
I'm wondering now if you all slept in tents or what, because MOSQUITOS! They were always the bane of my existence in the summertime. I can remember the nights if ONE SINGLE mosquito got into the bedroom, the three of us would turn on all the lights and spend however long it took to find and kill it. Even now, I can hear that whine in my ear.
No tents Nance! And yes, lots of mosquitoes! But I guess that is why their bites don't really affect me to this day. Sure I feel the bite, and I hate the whine, but I don't get a welt!
DeleteLove these stories of childhood that create an indelible bond between a parent and a child. So wonderful that your Dad made it even more special with his commentary during the bike rides. I think the older we get, the more we cherish these memories of our childhood. 💕
ReplyDeleteRe: Sweltering summer nights —
Up to the age of 13, we lived in states in the north. I don’t remember Boston much because I was only 4 years old. After that, we lived in upper-state New York in a small town on the south shore of Lake Ontario. All I remember about those 2 years was the frigid cold in the winters, lol. That said, I do remember when we lived in a rural community in Maryland (on the Chesapeake Bay) for the following 6 years and only had big window fans to fight the heat. Those fans were only downstairs in our living room, so upstairs, where our bedrooms were, there was nothing to do except for opening a window. Maybe we should have all gone downstairs to sleep, lol. When we moved to New Orleans, all the houses had air conditioning. Not central air back then, but the window units did the trick. The combination of high temperatures + insane humidity meant that AC was a necessity of life down there. As it is now, living in Texas. Last summer our AC conked out on a 100+ degree day of a heat wave. It was fixed within 24 hours, but those 24 hours seemed like a century. 😂
Ortizzle--My dad was a huge fan of fans in general. They were everywhere. He was all about "getting air moving."
DeleteI can't imagine living in TX without AC. Of course, when your grid fails, you don't have to imagine, right?
We didn't have AC in our little house until 1989. In 1988, we had a heat wave with temps sustained over 100 for days and days. The nights didn't really cool off, and our house really holds the heat. Rick and I vowed to get central air and never go through another summer without it.
That is an absolutely lovely memory. My dad has been gone 6 years today. I have an old answering machine (b/c I'm one of the few people on the planet who still has a landline). It doesn't work right anymore; so old. But it has all my dad's messages saved on it; will let them run one more time today, so I can hear his voice again. And then drag out the new machine.
ReplyDeletePlease look below for your response. Something glitched.
DeleteNot the only one. I have a landline too.
DeleteYour memories of those hot nights rings true with me. I'm smiling about the bike ride with your father. We didn't have AC and my upstairs bedroom was like yours with the sloped ceiling. So hot and stuffy up there. I slept downstairs on the floor sometimes, too, but no bike ride with Dad to cool me off.
ReplyDeleteAlly--Those converted attic rooms! Every house on our street was the same; so many of us can relate. Even my kids grew up sharing one, but they at least had the benefit of AC (and their own bathroom).
DeleteSleeping downstairs on the floor was always like a little adventure. Anything different was welcome and fun. Now, of course, you can take off on your own bike--as can I--but like most things as an adult, it's not the same as when we were kids.
Elle--Thank you.
ReplyDeleteI can tell you miss your dad, and six years is not very long ago. How lucky you are to have his voice recorded, speaking just to you, however mundane some of the messages may be. Maybe you can record the recordings so that you can have them even when the machine is gone.
Now that I'm thinking of it, I lost my dad in June as well, but 25 years ago. I felt oddly compelled by this memory. It appeared out of nowhere and just kept badgering me.
You've set this memory out so beautifully, Nance... I could feel the lifting mood, lightness of air, rush of memory as you sat on the crossbar of your father's bicycle... your curiosity about your father's life and your father's nostalgia that has now become yours... I love this piece so much.
ReplyDeleteBack home, on full-moon nights in the summer, my parents, sister, and I would have a picnic on our open-air terrace and sleep up there under the open sky. Appreciative now for this simple, inexpensive treat my parents made up for us.
I love life and am simultaneously awed by its speed, sometimes...
Thank you for this enchanting vignette--it's likely to live in my head forever (especially because of your title).
maya--Thank you, dear maya. Your words mean very much to me.
DeleteI'm imagining your lunar picnic, full of colour and cushions and laughter. I think it's so very true that simple, inexpensive, and thoughtful treats are often the most memorable. Turning the mundane into the special was always something my dad could do. Or at least that's what I thought. Maybe his presence when I was little was enough.
Life has sped up immensely since Theo entered the scene. I think Joy = Speed, perhaps.
Haven't stopped thinking about this <3. I feel there may be more about your childhood, memories of dad, and Lorain waiting for you to pen. I would read every word!
Deletemaya--Thank you so much. I'll keep that in mind. I'm very thankful that I grew up in South Lorain, a richly international and diverse place. And I learned a great deal from my father.
DeleteThanks for sharing that lovely memory!
ReplyDeleteEllen--I'm glad you liked reading it. Thanks always for your presence here.
DeleteWhat a lovely memory, Nance. Your writing made me feel like I was there!
ReplyDeleteMG--I'm always so grateful and pleased when my writing is complimented. It means a great deal to me. Thank you, and thank you for reading and commenting here.
DeleteWhat a lovely memory! You should write a book. Really!
ReplyDeleteWe had an attic fan that sort of helped, but what really helped was this ginormous window fan that we put in the living room window. You could reverse it so it was blowing out & that pulled air through the house. Theoretically. Then there was the time my dad tried to do some sort of cooling pipe situation by digging deep in the yard & connecting to the house. I'm not exactly sure how that was supposed to work - but it did NOT. Summers in NC were ugh.
Bug--Thank you. Wouldn't that be something?
DeleteYou know, I never really understood the whole Fan Blowing Out idea. It never really does anything, if you ask me. I mean, if there's smoke in the room, then yes. But it doesn't seem to me to help with cooling a room or making it feel less stuffy. I think it's all a scam.
The cooling pipe situation is mystifying. I'm completely clueless about all of THAT.
What a lovely story. I can picture it and it is very you. Your dad was way cool; and you conveyed it so well.
ReplyDeleteI can also relate to the hot bedroom part of it; my parents' house was a two storey brick and it turned into an oven in hot summer weather. My parents installed a big fan in the attic to suck in cooler air, and by, maybe, 1:00 am it would bring in relief. I can remember pulling my bed to the window and stripping off pajamas and sheet and lying there in a puddle of sweat waiting for that cool air.
My kids had a bit of the same thing, but a bungalow and big square fans in all the bedroom windows. Worked much better and sooner, and the climate was just better in eastern Ontario than in the 'sun belt' of Windsor. But no bike ride. How I loved your description.
If you want Really Hot, try sitting on a guard stand at an outdoor swimming pool. The pool was surrounded by a wide concrete deck and the heat just poured up from it, laden with chlorine fumes, and into the unshaded chair. We were not supposed to dive off the stand at the end of our shift, but we all did it.
I am reading what 'The Bug' wrote above and giggling to myself about the 'theoretically'. Yes. Indeed. 'Put cold water on your wrists', my mother would advise. Oh sure.
Mary--I'm smiling about your comment that my dad was cool. No one cared less about being hip or cool than my father. He was an individualist, and he made sure we were, too. He constantly told us we were "not part of the common herd," and that we were better than that. Heaven forbid if we wanted to follow a trend or act like anyone else.
DeleteI cannot imagine what would make anyone want to be a lifeguard at a public pool. Wrangling all those slippery wet kids in full sun, the constant noise, the heat, and the chlorine--I'd have a headache every single day.
My own mother's solution to the heat was always to spread a big blanket out under a shade tree and tell us to play with our dolls. Oh, and "don't think about it." She'd also put our long hair up in a Summer 'Do on top of our heads and make pitchers of Kool Aid. Now and then we'd set up the hose on a brick, set it to a fine mist, and run through it.
We all survived it, though, didn't we? Somehow. And thank you as always for your kind words about my writing and for being here with me.
Such a magical memory, Nance. Thanks so much for sharing with us. We could not have done any night riding on our country roads with no street lights and they really weren't safe to ride bikes on at all. The memories of doing everything to stay cool in our early years definitely resonates though. I remember the bit of relief the black oscillating fan gave growing up and how we had box fans strategically placed in the old farmhouse we lived in when we first got married. Eventually we got a box air conditioner but had to place it in our guest room because there was a roof line there to support it and there was not one in our bedroom. So we moved to the guest room during the summer. We ate a lot of meals there as well. Oh, the joys of air conditioning! I will admit that I still don't really like to hear it running. (My HVAC is right outside my bedroom window. Terrible plan that we had no input on.)
ReplyDeleteShirley--Oh, those old oscillating fans! Some of them were real death traps with almost no concern for finger safety.
DeleteI love imagining your move to the guest room each summer so that you could be cool and comfortable as newlyweds. What a sweet memory of those early days.
Like you, I'm very grateful and appreciative of air conditioning. Still, I'd rather not have to use it at all. I vastly prefer windows open and fresh air. AC makes me feel cocooned and a little groggy with sounds blocked out--almost disconnected from Nature and life outside. And I don't like to hear the sound of it in general, even though ours is not too loud.
Our AC at the lakehouse IS right outside our bedroom--same thing as your situation, not our decision. I'm used to it now, but it's still annoying.
I'm glad you enjoyed this piece; thanks for reading and for being here with me.
What a wonderful memory and you write it with such love and beauty. I grew up in Florida in a two-story home in the summers. Upstairs in the bedrooms were awful. We all had oscillating fans that did nothing but stir the hot air, but the winters were much cooler than than they are today. I can even remember wearing winter coats and we had a wood-burning fireplace. What a wonderful memory of your father. He must’ve been terrific.
ReplyDeleteMary--Hello! Welcome to the Dept. Thank you for your kind words about my writing. I value those compliments so much.
DeleteI can't imagine wearing winter coats in Florida, ever. Or using a wood-burning fireplace. I remember driving from Northeastern Ohio down to Florida in March for spring vacation and loving the temperature difference; shedding our winter coats and long pants was such a heady ritual. That and opening the windows to feel the warmer air as we drove.
My father was a very complex person, full of almost magical moments like this one. He had many faults, of course, but these beautiful gestures were golden.
This is such a great and unique memory. Thanks for sharing it here.
ReplyDeleteMy parents avoided using the AC whenever possible. We often slept in the family room where there was a better breeze because of the sliding glass door. We'd all file down there and find a spot on the floor. Sometimes even my parents slept on the first floor, my dad in his underwear. Maybe if someone had taken me for a bike ride late at night, I'd have better memories of those hot nights. ;)
Ernie--I'm glad you enjoyed reading it, and I'm always glad to hear from you.
DeleteI get why your parents probably avoided turning on the AC. It likely raised the electric bill significantly. Even Rick and I used to have The Big Decision Discussion--"Should we close up? What does the forecast look like? Is it going to cool off anytime soon? Are the neighbours closed up?" It was ridiculous. Now there's not even a mention; if one of us is uncomfortable, he/she turns on the AC. Period.
I absolutely love this memory; thank you for sharing it with us.
ReplyDeleteWhat a privilege to grow up like this, with loving parents and a safe place where you didn't have to lock your doors at night. I mean, I don't recall worrying about our windows being shut up or the doors being locked, but now? *shudder*
The night time bike rides sound so beautiful.
We didn't always have a/c in our house growing up and for the life of me, I can't imagine how we survived the Florida summers.
BB Suz--Thanks for reading. I'm always pleased when my writing here strikes a chord.
DeleteMy old neighbourhood wasn't idyllic, but it was safe back then and we knew all the neighbours. It was a blue-collar, nosy place where everyone watched out for each other, and the streets were quiet. Now? I don't think it's like that anymore, but few places are.
I don't know how anyone in the deep South manages without AC. We get very humid here in NEO in the summertime sometimes, and I absolutely can't handle it. No way could I do Florida without central air.
oh they don’t anymore do without AC. This was way back for me like 70 years ago. We did get a scene by the time I was in junior high school.
DeleteI enjoyed reading this so much. What bliss that must have been, having your father all to yourself on those rides.
ReplyDeleteYou have reminded me of the hot nights of my childhood. I should write about that, as you just did. Thank you for the memory jog!
G Sue--Thank you. There were four of us kids, and my father managed to find a way to spend a little time with each of us now and then, and often doing what suited us best. He could be very intuitive that way.
DeleteSo many of us Of A Certain Age can recall getting through summers without benefit of air conditioning. Imagine our parents, trying to settle fussy, hot kids when they themselves are worn out and sweltering, too!
I really think that we were able to have magical childhoods in a way. I can remember going down the street to "sleep out" in the backyard with friends. Never a thought or worry about anything bad happening, from us or from our parents. I love this memory of yours!
ReplyDeleteBridget--I think parts of our childhood seem magical because we remember them fondly as we experienced them--from a child's perspective. Of course we didn't worry! That was always someone else's job. We only had to do as we were told. Life is pretty simple that way.
DeleteThere were plenty of tough times--even worrisome times. I think our psyches protect us and let many of those memories go, or we don't process them deeply as children. Like a sort of Defense Mechanism.
But yes, this memory is a very pleasant one that is a joy to recall, despite the heat of summer nights back then. It's a full-on sensory recall: the breeze in my hair and on my bare legs; the slight discomfort of the crossbar on my legs and bottom; the sound of the rubber tires on the asphalt streets; the sway as my dad would take the turns at the corners; the smells of peonies, honeysuckle, wild roses, and sometimes garlic from the Eastern European homes. It all comes back.