#53 Weather Dance

After a hard rain that wreaked havoc with a local fair, it was easy to wish
that we could mandate good weather. But I remembered a cautionary tale from
my childhood about a prince and his magic rain cloud. He could produce a
storm at any time, but there was always somebody who pleaded for sunshine,
he heeded their pleas, and the land got dryer and dryer (though of course
the story ended up with a good rainstorm). It's probably just as well that
the government doesn't manage the weather, but we do chafe at not having
more control.

I guess it's because we've figured out so much about controlling the
weather, at least indoors. We've mastered so much that we feel entitled to
mastery-so life can go on every day just as we've planned it. It's
shocking, somehow, not to be in control of the weather. Surely an advanced,
technological affluent county such as ours shouldn't still be subject to
something so primitive and elemental. It just doesn't seem right. So we
compensate, by proving how cold we can make it in the summer, how hot in the
winter. It would be more rational (and way more fuel-efficient) to find an
indoor temperature that everyone would agree on for all seasons. But I'd go
even farther. I'd advocate for some of the pleasures of difference that
we've lost in our drive for uniformity of comfort.

This would mean rebuilding our relationship with the weather. It would mean
rediscovering the cycles of the day and of the year: getting up earlier in
the heat to enjoy the cool mornings, slowing down in the afternoons,
drinking in hot summer evenings filled with crickets and fireflies, filling
up the house with cool night air. It would mean learning the art of
dressing in layers, looking forward to the joys of snow, warming chilled
hands in front of a fire (or a space heater), eating hearty soups, really
appreciating the heat in a cup of hot tea or cocoa. It would mean
tolerating some discomfort. There may be times to insulate ourselves in
climate-controlled cocoons, but if that becomes our world, we lose one
that's so much bigger.

It would mean rediscovering our niche in different regions. I think of the
"salt box" houses that developed in New England. The north-facing side had
a steeply sloping roof, no windows and plantings of coniferous trees to hold
insulating snow and keep out cold winds. The south side had space to
accommodate many windows, and deciduous trees to provide leafy shade in the
summer and let in lots of winter sun when their leaves were gone. Yet now,
houses of that shape are put up all over the country, facing every which
way, and trees are purely for show. We have strayed so far from our roots
that we don't even notice. Interchangeable styles have replaced the
elegance of function and relation to place-and it is a loss.

Of course, weather is not totally benign. There will be periods of
oppressive heat and cold, tragic weather disasters. But if we're in
opposition and vying for control, the effect of these occasions will likely
be bigger. We need to learn to be a partner, leading sometimes perhaps, but
many times just following-getting into the rhythm and learning the pleasures
of the dance.

Pamela Haines
Philadelphia, 2/07




Diagonal

Encountering a ramp so clogged
it warns of endless crawl,
I sheer off, heading for another route
north out of town.

Pursuing a diagonal
I find myself not lost
but where I’ve never been--
vacant lots, row houses past their prime,
worn-down survival up against the tracks.

I jog onto a narrow street,
am struck--by horses--
a tiny stable yard wedged into the row
an old man with his horse amid the cars
others chatting on their stoops--
a farm scene overlaid upon
this dense packed city street.

A glimpse and then it’s gone.
In seconds I am headed north
on roads I’ve known for years.
Yet that block stays with me--
a prize for traveling the unknown
a jewel on the diagonal.