A Summer Tan

This summer has flown by so fast! Many of the things I listed on my "Summer-To-Do List" (thinking I would have more time in the lazy ? days of summer) just will not be done at all. It has been a very enjoyable, though extremely hot, Texas summer. That stretch of 11 straight days over 100 degrees each day has worn me out, physically and financially. The physical part is from having to be out in the heat more often, to take care of the new filly, Stormy, born June 18th, and her mother, Esmo. My old mare, Jet,  26-years-old, is to foal any day now, so I am paying particular attention to her, going out into the heat and checking on her several times a day.  The financial part comes from the almost twice as high as usual electric bill caused by the continuous running of the air conditioner to keep the house cool.   The heat is so oppressive!  It zaps your energy completely. When I have to go outside in the afternoon to water the horses and give extra hay and so forth, I put on my bathing suit and stay cool by getting wet from the water hose...just as my sister, Sue, and I , and the cousins and friends used to do as kids on those long ago hot summer days. I think longingly of Cold Springs, where we kids would run from our house to just across the street to jump into that ice-cold swimming hole in Cameron Park, chill in that almost freezing water as long as we could stand it, then run back home, thoroughly cooled off and so cold our lips were blue. I firmly believe that global warming is real and  the world is hotter now than when I was a child growing up. I do not think we could have stayed out in the heat like we did then, if it had been as hot as it seems now.  Maybe it is the humidity.  The best thing to come out of the heat this summer is the fact that I now have a really great tan, something I have not had in years.