Cenote Summer???

Okay, so the title is a bit of a misnomer.  No cenote visits this time, no Mayan ruins or museum visits.  With all our running around this summer it is nice to take a day once in a while to just sit in the pool and enjoy our own little paradise.

                May was hot.  We knew it would be hot.  Everyone has told us since we moved to Merida, “May is the hottest month”.  People not from the Yucatan are usually amazed that May is the hottest month of the year…we were.  I grew up in Kentucky, where the hottest months were July and August.  But by July and August in Merida you are beginning to feel a slight cooling effect.   Okay, I guess I can’t really call it cooling, but it is definitely less hot, more tolerable. 

You really learn the reason for the famous Mexican siesta when you spend the month of May in the Yucatan.  There is no way you can do much between the hours of noon and 4:00 PM.  It is simply too hot.  Just walking to the grocery store causes me to sweat my body dry.  I cannot drink water and Gatorade fast enough.  That is why I am so much in awe of anyone who works outside for a living.  Our construction workers last summer worked their buns off…even when the mercury reached the top of the thermometer. 

Why aren't you here?

The sun seems to be about a mile overhead, and makes even the stamped concrete walkway an experience akin to walking on hot coals.  So a couple days a week I take a few hours and sit in the pool with my Kindle, trying to finish the impossibly long read I am currently half-way through, or continue my Spanish studies by stumbling through the online version of the local newspaper, Diario.  I ease myself into the refreshing, cool water, and instantly experience a renewed sense of being.  It is heaven.  The heat disappears as I settle into the shallow end, where I can sit with my head above the water.  I prop myself in the corner, pick up my reader, and soak up a little color while the Germans plan for their attack on Poland.

An hour slips by in an instant.  I am refreshed and have forgotten about the heat of the afternoon.  I pause to watch as the plastic swan chlorine dispenser moves past me on its never-ending laps around the pool, propelled by the pool’s water jets.  Every so often I dip my head under water, keeping even that huge sun-magnet cool and breezy. 

I feel ready to tackle another project; I can face sealing the casita roof or cutting the overgrowth from the neighbor’s yard.  There are painting touch-ups to be completed and concrete cracks to repair, and I’m ready to tackle them all.  So I stand and start for the pool stairs as the heat begins to again swirl around me and I see the hot air rising off the walkway.  Ah, heck, those cracks won’t be getting any bigger; I think I’ll just take a few more moments and try to finish this book.   After all, why else am I living in Paradise?