Cabin Fever - Desert Style

     I have almost always lived in desert cities. For some reason fate thinks its funny to stick my fair Celtic skin designed for constant rain in places it will fry or turn me into an epic dot to dot page. And right about the 100 degree mark, my mood starts to turn like meat left out on the counter, I reek of pent up energy and anger at the sun. I curse it's constant, cloudless beat down upon the sidewalk burning my toes when I risk a barefoot walk to take the garbage out. I start climbing the walls, a snarling, raving beast of resentment at being caged between four air-conditioned walls with two crazy little boys.

     In summer, the desert turns into a literal ghost town. Snow birds fly back to their 80 degree homes in Vancouver, Oregon, Idaho smartly migrating from one cool dwelling to another. Restaurants and shops reduce their hours closing down early from a lack of clientele. Mom's Night Out's are limited to the few bars and bands left playing on select nights only. That's if you can scrounge up enough moms to even go out, most people fleeing the desert for vacations in cooler climates.

     Sometimes I feel like Charlton Heston in Planet of the Apes waking to a strange world, monuments covered in sand, and not another living being in site. (Obviously, the part before he meets the apes.) Or a lone straggler who's car broke down on the highway finally falling upon an old abandoned western town tumbleweeds drifting past, wind whistling lonely through vacant buildings, no one to talk to except a cactus you ironically name Teddy. 

     If I don't see their car pull into the drive, the quick bustle of bodies in another air-conditioned space, I don't know if my neighbors are home. The streets are bare, no one exchanges greetings, no  one plays at the park, the baked plastic would scorch anyone who dared. I almost fainted yesterday seeing a kid walking around in the midday sun, until I saw the cellphone and realized the lengths people will go to play Pokemon Go, even risk sun stroke.

     Whenever I visit San Diego or my aunt's in Oregon, I am stunned to see neighbors outside talking to each other, sitting on porch's waving, kids running in and out of other people's houses, or playing basketball outside. It's like looking at a Richard Scary book there should be labels over their heads so I can identify who they are: Basketball playing kid, swinging kid, elderly neighbor, man walking dog, etc. 

     I met a friend on accident at the ice skating rink, and she commented on how the desert has changed her nature. Almost conditioned her to not know what to do if she even sees someone outside, all social etiquette gone, just an instinct to get inside. 

     Now I know I am blessed with lower house prices, less traffic, and better parking than those cooler urban spaces to the west of me. And I realize from mid-November to March, our weather brings flocks of people envious for our mild winters. 

     But I hate having to patrol Facebook to see if my friends are in town or text my son's friend's mothers over and over till I feel like I am begging for them to drop their kid off for a playdate. I don't know what the answer is. It's the literal climate and the social media climate that we live in. For now, I swim alone.