TOO HOT TO SLEEP

So for the twimptieth night in a row, it’s too hot to sleep. Still no rain out there, although I did hear a rumour that there might be some on the way.

I don’t wish to complain really. We get few heatwaves in this country, and we’re genetically hardwired to be temperate in the face of extreme weathers. It’s just that we’re not really used to it being so baking hot all the time.

The generation above me are though. They lived through it in the Long Hot Summer of 1976, a season so dry, so warm, so long that every single heatwave in the last 42 years has been compared to it. One day there’ll be no-one left to make the comparison or go on about it, I’ll wager.

I feel like my brain’s gone mushy. It’s always worked best in cold environments - sharp, crisp, clear, like an icicle. Today it’s just all melty. And even my vision has been slow to catch up with where my eyes are looking.

Why can’t we harness this heat and use it up in winter? There’s plenty to go round. But of course, thermodynamics is mean.

I might just close my eyes and imagine I’m lying on a raft instead of a duvet. Above me the blue sky and singing birds, below me the quietly churning river. The trees drift by either side, and lazy clouds hang like cotton in the hot sunshine.

Far away, the waters thunder. But not with rain. I open my eyes.

Why am I so on-edge all the time? Surely that can’t be helping me. I just want to go to sleep now, without worrying what waterfalls await me. It’s way too hot for worrying about all of that.