THE WEEK BEFORE I LEFT OUR RIVERSIDE FLOATING HOME in Oregon, the temperatures were close to 100 degrees Fahrenheit for several days with one afternoon’s temp bursting through to 103. Probably dry heat, you say? Not really. Not living next to a flowing river channel.
Still, between our stand-up paddle boards, life jackets and a wild assortment of floaty toys we stayed relatively cool, dipping into the water - a cool 75 degrees. One blowup paddle board did become a heat casualty. It simply exploded as it expanded beyond its stretchable limits.
BUT A FUNNY THING HAPPENED when I traveled via jet to upstate NY this week where temperatures are a couple of degrees lower but with definitely higher humidity. The funny thing? Despite the boost of humidity it actually feels cooler. A few hours ago I was at festive soiree with 100 or so people at a winery open air pavillion. The 90-plus degree temperatures and normally sweat-inducing humidity felt fine. Maybe it was the music casting a spell.
In my Finger Lakes Times column Friday, July 12 (published below) I wrote about summer heat, remembering that even as a kid who loved every minute of June, July and August, 82 degrees was considered very toasty in rural NY. Today many people scoff at 82 as not being really hot. But since this column was published, I heard from several folks who noted (and mostly lament) the gradual climate-change-induced rise in summer temps from hot, to really hot, to damn hot.
They even called it the “new normal.”
Remember when 82 degrees was hot?
By MICHAEL J. FITZGERALD, Finger Lakes Time columnist
THE THERMOMETER AT MY LAKEWOOD, NY HOME was just outside the back door when I was growing up, easily checked to see how hot - or cold - the day was. The summer benchmark for what we called hot was 82 degrees, a temperature today that might seem a pleasant data point. But in the 1960s, that was hot. Really hot.
Then, as today, humidity factored in, of course. We didn’t have an instrument to measure it. But my grandmother was a walking hygrometer. If she opined that it was muggy it was official. Humidity was high. Her declaration reinforced why the thermometer’s 82 degrees meant near insufferable.
AIR-CONDITIONED HOME WERE UNKNOWN IN MY COMMUNITY. Ditto for air conditioning in most cars. And schools. With the official school attendance year running well into June, early summer classes at high school were more sauna than scholastic. And wearing shorts to be cooler? Totally verboten.
It wasn’t until I moved west to some non-muggy climes that I learned about dry heat, essentially high temperatures but minus much humidity. Don’t believe the hype that dry heat can’t be overwhelming. One hundred degrees with even near-zero humidity is bloody hot. It can rapidly trigger dehydration as sweat evaporates more quickly than you can gasp ‘dehydration’ a dozen times. A trip to the dry heat of the Mojave Desert proved that for me. If it hadn’t been for quick action on my wife’s part, a lot of liquids and an airconditioned public library, I might have landed in an emergency room.
THAT SUMMERS ARE WARMER YEAR-BY-YEAR IS A STATISTICAL FACT, something even the most fervent climate-change deniers can’t dispute. As this is written, record high temperatures are being recorded across the nation, wreaking havoc in dozens of ways. And 2024 is predicted to be the hottest year ever on record. And 2025? More of same, likely even hotter, most predictions indicate.
This past week the temperature in this corner of the Northwest is close to 90 degrees at 9 a.m., expected to be 105 by mid-afternoon. And humidity? Brutal.
A FEW DAYS AGO I CANCELED MY ATTENDANCE at a much-anticipated public meeting with Bill McKibben, noted environmentalist, author and journalist who writes about climate change and global warming. He is also leader of the climate campaign 350.org. The venue’s air-conditioning and cooling system seemed inadequate, considering how amazingly hot it was. A full house of folks was expected to squeeze into a very small space.
Yes, it was quite ironic to skip a session about efforts to dampen the effects of climate change because, well, we were leery of getting overheated.
Earlier in the week, as temperatures soared, I noticed a long line of people outside one of the city’s largest public libraries. Some were certainly bibliophiles, eager to get books. But many were likely seeking refuge from the heat in one of the few air conditioned public buildings that welcome people to stay for as long as they want.
In past years, I routinely enjoyed traveling the blue highways from the West Coast to the Finger Lakes, pulling my small red T@B teardrop travel trailer. But summer 2023 was killer hot, every mile from the Oregon border to New York. No state or area was spared the excessive heat. Arriving in Watkins Glen in early July, I was greeted by a mid-afternoon temperature of 100 degrees. My long-deceased granny would certainly have said it was incredibly muggy that day, too.
We are blessed in the Finger Lakes with abundant, clean water in lakes and streams to help ameliorate our ever-warming summers. Because many people can take afternoon swims and waterside picnics, it’s possible for them to ignore or dismiss the new normal. But many people can’t. It’s real and going to get hotter.
I’m not sure what practical, long-term solutions we really have. But in the meantime, all we can do is try to stay cool this summer. Cool and safe.
Fitzgerald has worked at six newspapers as a writer and editor as well as a correspondent for two news services. He splits his time between Valois, NY and the Pacific Northwest. You can email him at Michael.Fitzgeraldfltcolumnist@gmail.com and visit his websites at michaeljfitzgerald.blogspot.com and michaeljfitzgerald.substack.com.