The Hartley Sentinel-The Everly/Royal News - Serving O'Brien & Clay Counties

I like to think of myself as an optimistic cynic. I always hope things pan out positively, but rarely do dreams line up with reality.

Such is the case this spring... er, early summer. Never has the phrase, “Is it hot enough for ya?” been worn so thin and we’re still more than two weeks away from the Fourth of July. This month has been one heck of a hot one.

I feel especially qualified to moan on and on about this subject. As you might remember from my previous gripes in this space, our 104-year-old Ocheyedan home has nary an air duct in it thanks to our boiler heating system, making central air an impossibility. We struggle through the hot summer months with three window AC units that do the best they can. There’s no space anywhere to install more efficient mini-splits either, as our windows are too large and the space beneath and above them too small.

After stretches like these last two weeks, 78 degrees is about as cold as it gets downstairs during the afternoon. The upstairs stays more comfortable because we have two units going nonstop. You can feel the difference when you hit the landing on our staircase.

Our kids don’t seem to mind the house’s temp, but I’m no cheap date. I get irritated as soon as I walk through the door. I get quite snippy, too – if one of them leaves the porch door open for more than 2 seconds, they’re going to hear about it.

I’ve realized my vocal misery only works to make those around me annoyed. In an effort to beat the heat last Thursday, we headed to the Ocheyedan Pits for a quick dip. The local swimming hole provided a bit of relief, but unfortunately, the lack of rain and high temps had made conditions a bit tepid and rank. The water was still clear and the weeds weren’t horrid, but I’ve never seen it that low in my 30 years of life.

I was sitting on our patio after the sun went down Monday and things starting cooling off pretty decently. I looked at the night’s forecast on my phone, and as soon as I saw that it was supposed to get down to 57 degrees that night, I beelined it inside and started opening windows. I was able to shut our ACs off for the first time in two weeks and was extremely happy about it.

Since our house is a fishbowl, we have 37 windows to open downstairs and upstairs. I took great pleasure in feeling the cool breeze roll through the living room as I folded laundry after everything was open. Following two weeks of misery, our home could finally breathe.

The immediate forecast looks tolerable, but the cynic in me keeps pulling the reigns back. We’re not even technically to summer yet and I’m not hopeful that we’ve seen the hottest month yet. That very logical concern was driven home by my grandma recently.

While I was complaining about the hot temperatures last Thursday, she recalled a particularly brutal heat wave one year when she was a young girl in the 1930s.

“I think it was at least 100 degrees everyday that July,” she said, noting water wells started drying up. “Of course back then, we didn’t really have fans in the house.”

That shut me up real quick and gave me some perspective. Though the window AC units might not keep our home at my ideal temperature, at least we have them.

It could always be worse. Here’s to hoping July is a little cooler and a lot wetter.

Nick Pedley is the news editor of The Hartley Sentinel-The Everly/Royal News.