Seared

This morning the sky was a burnished blue enamel beneath a blazing brass sun. The cool air heated up quickly as the sun rose in a fiery ball above the horizon burning more and more of the cool away until the breezes were warm exhalations that did little to keep me cool. The blinds in the bedroom and bathroom shut out the light but the sun room is full of blazing yellow that touches off the sweating, panting flush of fire that radiates from me like a radioactive cloud. My hands sweat and my fingers stick to the keyboard so that I can barely type without an error even with my macros set and functional. I still have to type the right few keys to get the rest of the sentence or paragraph and I cannot seem to manage even that. My temper is short, frayed by the constant rasp of hot fitful breezes and the scratch and scrape of the painters as they prepare the house for painting. I want them gone. I want the windows open. I want to work without feeling like a goldfish in a glass bowl. I want...

The sky is grumbling, threatening rain but holding back the torrent. A momentary whisper of cool brushes my cheek or my arms, a cruel promise never fulfilled as the sun fires the cooling breeze. Lightning flickers and dies and the leaden sky with its mauve tints and cool cream colored underskirts near the horizon rolls ponderously over. A few spatters of rain drop through the leaves and disappear into the dry ground. Rain spits and spats and moves on, unable to make good on its promise, at least not here.

Even as I lie down on the bed in front of the fan perpetually moving hell through the breathless air, I cannot sleep or rest or find comfort. I keep reminding myself it could be worse as a few splashes of body temperature water dry on my fevered skin leaving a patch of cool quickly swallowed by summer's heat. I cannot concentrate. I cannot sit still. I cannot focus and work. I cannot ... move.

And the dog days haven't yet barked. Antarctica is looking really good right now.