Southwest Desert Heat Wave

I saw on the news that it was one hundred and eighteen degrees out where my brother lived. I called him up to see how he was doing.

             "Well, it's definitely hot," he said," and chuckled, I'm sure imagining my horror. He knew I wasn't a fan of hot weather, even less so when it was ultra-hot like he was experiencing. He paused for a moment and then piled it on, "Yeah, the cactus are wilting, my pool's like a hot tub and you can fry an egg on the sidewalk. It sizzles."

            Brutal. I wondered if he was joking, but, honestly, I couldn't tell. "Sounds like hell to me," I tell him.

            "I'm only partially kidding. It's not so bad. It's a dry heat," he said, and laughed again. "I go for my run at five in the morning when it's only ninety degrees or so." I could see him grinning on the phone. Sweating and grinning. He loved it out there in the desert heat.

            Later, after I hung up, I stepped outside into the cool shade of the woods of my northern Minnesota home. This time of year our biggest concern is getting eaten alive by insects. However, wasn't the buzzing of bugs I heard just then, but the sizzling of that egg on that scorching desert sidewalk outside my brother's house, frying in my ears. The sound didn't leave until long after the stars had come out, blanketing the sky, and a fresh breeze had blown in off the lake, cooling my skin, driving the memory of that desert heat far, far away, back to where it belonged.