Intemperate

As my name implies, I have some Hellenic roots, which, as I live in the US, appear to be very, very long. As much as I move around, it's amazing they don't get tangled up in things. I have other roots too, almost as long, but that's another story, so you'll be happy to know you won't be hearing about them this time.

The point is, the older I get, the more my Greek blood calls out for a Mediterranean climate, a word that has nothing to do with either climbing or mating, but can be rearranged to spell "crab tie", "male tic" or even "I'm a Celt". Anyway, I don't know if your body fluids talk to you, but I seem more and more inclined to listen to mine.

I've spent most of my adult life in Colorado, where I have to admit the winters are much milder than they are in Wisconsin or Michigan or other arctic nations where Independence Day barbeques traditionally result in frostbite.

By the way, are you aware that many Americans actually believe there are people living in Canadia? Really, it's true! Apparently they don't realize that Canadia is a frozen wasteland with a made up population, a metaphorical residence for people who are too polite and embarrased to admit they come from Detroit or Buffalo or Fargo. There are three Canadian provinces, North Montana, Even Farther North Dakota, and the North Pole, but no one ever goes there, because they're closed for the ice age .

Colorado on the other hand, has much less severe winters, and people actually live here, including me for much of my life. And even though I've never been a fan of cold weather, I adapted like everyone else and put up with it. I can see now there is a simple explanation for this: I was stupid.

Why else would I voluntarily live in a climate where running out of gas turns my car into a reach in freezer? What is important to realize here is that this is not an outcome that requires planning, resources, and effort to achieve, just the opposite. Planning, resources and effort are required to prevent me from becoming a Dancicle, because most of the year, "Ma" Nature is trying to kill me. My own mother! Not only that, but she's sneaky about it, throwing her coldest cold at me in the middle of the night when I'm most vulnerable, lying in bed, unconscious.

Think about this, I have to live in a sealed, continuously climate controlled shelter. I have to put on a specially designed moisture resistant and thermally insulated suit just to protect me from the air . I need an enclosed vehicle with its own life support system to travel to other structures with artificial environments protected by their own temperature and moisture barriers because if I had to face the ambient conditions without them ol' "Ma" would turn me into a pillar of ice in a matter of minutes. It's like living on the Moon, only with more things to do, which are just more reasons to go outside and embrace hypothermia.   

"Ma" has made it perfectly clear I'm not welcome here. Face it, humanoids are not designed like the native life forms, including the other mammals, who are all issued fur coats as standard equipment before they are even born.  

Not us, we were designed for warm weather, and everyone knows it. When you hear the word"paradise", what do you think of? Cleveland? Reykjavik? Hell no, you think of Hawaii, right? Or some other place where it's against the law (of nature) for the temperature to fall below 75 degrees. These are the places where the original inhabitants didn't even have words for snow or ice, let alone the phrase freeze to death.

We even avoid winter in our imaginary lives. How many movies take place during the Winter? That's because romantic strolls in the park and shootouts with drug lords just don't look the same when the principals involved are all wearing down parkas, thinsulate gloves and rabbit fur bomber hats. How often does a car chase consist of a guy digging his car out of the snow and then not being able to get it started? Who wants to watch that? Especially when you had to go through it yourself just trying to get to the theater.

No, movies are almost always set in the Summertime, when you can actually do things other than get in and out of forty pounds of thermal combat gear and fight your way to work and home again everyday in a six month war with the planet to stay alive until the world begins to thaw in the spring.

We evolved into modern humans in equatorial Africa where the weather was nice and warm. This isn't a value judgement, it's a fact. A congenial climate was a condition of our development for millions of years. It's only the arrogance of a big, cranial mutation that takes a creature into an enviroment incompatible with the survival of its body and keeps it there for five hundred generations. The Neanderthals moved to Europe during an ice age and look where it got them.

It takes most people many years to figure this out, but eventually many do. That's why there are more retirement communities in Florida and Arizona than there are in Wisconsin. After a lifetime of fighting the weather, these people have finally faced the fact they'll never win, surrendered, and retreated to a climate that's an ally.

Me too! I moved to the desert. I love it here!

So do the rattlesnakes, tarantulas and scorpions.

copyright © 2002 Dan Manthos