During our first week here, we drove on an overpass on the way to the library and Nate said, "It's funny, in Michigan we have overpasses for going over water; here, they're for going over a little canyon of desert area."
Yes, as it turns out those "little canyons of desert" become washes for the rivers of rain to flow through during this, Arizona's monsoon season. ( I've read that it is improper grammar to use the word "season" with the word "monsoon" because monsoon is a season; we do tend to say the "fall season" or the "winter season" and it didn't sound right to just say "it is monsoon in Arizona"...) These monsoon thunderstorms are akin to spring and summer thunderstorms in Michigan. As in Michigan, they can be violent and sudden, knocking power lines down and causing floods. But, the glaring difference is that because they get rain so infrequently here throughout the entire year (they don't have images of a cacti on their state license plates for nothing), the ground is considerably harder so when it does rain, the parched earth can't imbibe that gift from the sky as zestfully or as willingly as it does in Michigan. (Also, as my husband's buddy pointed out, they don't have nearly as many drains here as they do back east--he's from Rhode Island.)
Bottom line: Water easily overwhelms here in Arizona.
Tantamount to how the exceptional temperatures of Arizona can easily overwhelm a native Michigander like me.
On our first day at our new apartment, I had gone out to purchase necessities such as food staples, contact paper, and a shower curtain. It was 112 degrees Fahrenheit. Nathan aptly compared the feeling of walking outside to that of when you feel the blast of heat when opening a hot oven, "only it never goes away and it's all around your body and face...all the time". Or, he said, it's like standing next to a hot car engine but again, he addded,"all the time, all over your body, and in your face". As if I could forget. Yes, perfect analogies, I told him.
As I trekked across the vast black-top parking lot toward the store, I took a deep breath and embraced that oven-like quality of the intense Arizona heat. Rather than complain to myself, "Man, it's hot out here!"--I was actually smiling at what an intriguingly different sensation walking outside could be. Not bad; just different.
I promise you, I am not a heat person. My favorite season is autumn in Michigan, with an Indian Summer or two thrown in. Sixty to seventy-eight degrees Fahernheit---ahhhhh. Bliss. I can keep my windows open to feel the cool breezes or let the whispering leaves of the great Oak in my front yard lull me to sleep each night.
Honestly, I truly was embracing Arizona's delightfully distinct desert climate. Though it's consistantly hotter here, it's lighter, not so heavy, and amazingly, on that 112 degree day, I barely broke into a sweat. It's discombobulating, really. In Michigan when it reaches the 90s as it often does in the summer, you can count on a massive side of heavy, humid air to go with it. Hot humidity goes hand in hand with sweat, more sweat, and mosquitos!
Not an issue here in Arizona. Hallelujah!
On the flip side, during that shopping trip on that first day here, as I roamed through the store I thought, Boy, I need to drink some more water when I get home.
Then, ten minutes later: Whew! I wish there was a water fountain right here where I'm standing.
And finally, just: Water...water...Oh, I need to grab a silverware tray...water...water...Oh yeah, and a trash container...and where are those shower curtains?...water-water-water...I better buy a water bottle at the check-out to drink on the way home...cool, cool water...Mmmm-can't wait for that waterwaterwaterwater...
But by the time I had reached the cashier, I realized I couldn't wait until I was at the car to drink. I cracked the cap open right there in front of the cashier, waiting (smiling, but actually impatient) for her to hand me the receipt, and immediately thereafter--I drank.
And drank. And drank some more.
It was only a regular 20 ounce bottle, but I'm not much of a drinker in general. Yeah, yeah, I'm a nurse in another life and I know how important water is and that I was already dehydrated when I felt that thirst, but I can't guzzle it and I rarely drink 64 ounces daily. Not even when I overhydrate myself three or four days before giving blood. More like 30-40 ounces in Michigan; about 50 ounces here in Arizona (and I feel great and my urine is clear...on a day of hiking or other such activity, of course, it's much more). But when I get busy, as I was on that day of moving and all...well, I tried to be conscious of my fluid intake (and I love water--it's my number one beverage choice) but I'm sure I slacked.
So that July first day, when I guzzled 15 ounces of H2O before heading back out in that arid Arizona air, I could actually feel the individual cells of my body expanding their withered, semipermeable plasma membranes in joyful appreciation.
I've worked out my whole life. I've done lots of runs for charity--lots of training for those runs--long runs, too; I trained for and completed a marathon (held here in Arizona--but in January), but the thirst I felt that day was definately a different animal. It stayed with me for days--the memory of that feeling, that full-body, parched feeling. Later that week, the kids and I watched the movie, "Holes". Though I've always empathized with strong movie characters, this time I was sure that when I'd seen it years earlier, I'd only thought I could understand how thirsty and hot and dry those kids felt in that desperate desert doom. But now...now I felt like we were kindred spirits. Now I felt I knew exactly how thirsty they really were!
Or so I told myself.
Hooray for water!
Hooray for Michigan's abundance of it!
Hooray for Arizona (for teaching me a much deeper appreciation for it)!
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