Chilling Out in a Heat Wave (all types)
Fat Tomato Summer - vol. 004
The hottest I’ve ever been in my life was approximately eleven years ago in Manta, Ecuador. I was on a blogger “influencer” trip for Compassion International. Calvin, aged ten, was with me. We woke up one morning in “land of eternal spring” Quito, and boarded a tiny airplane for Manta, but not before Cal turned a specific shade of pistachio green at the airport and I considered for the first time that public vomiting might somehow be a learned family trait. Nurture > nature.
But you didn’t set aside part of your Fat Tomato day to listen to me shame-spiral about vomiting in front of a former Bachelorette and various other mid-to-high-society women in a passenger van on the dusty roads of Ethiopia.
Somehow, Calvin gained control of his medulla oblongata, we boarded that plane, and a short flight later, we landed in soup. Respectfully. I was sucker-punched by the humidity. My dad of “two buckets” fame has spent my entire life trying to explain the nuances of dew point. It never took, but I’m confident even he would have stood slumped in awe at the chewiness of that air.
The locals were entirely unbothered, aglow in the best way possible. Sunny, welcoming, and tanly matte. Their bangs were not plastered unattractively against their foreheads. They were not pitting out.
Incidentally, our one day in rural Manta was the most memorable and fun of a very special trip. Two things can be true at the same time. Like neck sweat and joy.
I’ve spent a good bit of time harkening back to that trip with Cal, eleven years later. Because this week, it feels like Ecuador in Indiana. We’re in yet another heat wave, trapped beneath yet another heat dome.
It begs the question, is this just how it is now?
