Burning sun. Pouring rain. This is summer in Brisbane, Australia.

It's Sunday
early afternoon
my friend has just arrived
and the first thing she says after her long drive is:

Can we get in the pool immediately?

No one's around
so in tiny bikinis
we enter the saltwater pool.

She's put sunscreen on her face
wears a hat and sunnies.
I do none of these things.

We talk and stand in the pool.
She gets cold
we sit by the side of the pool
in the shade
the sun reflecting off the water.
She gets hot again
we get back in the pool.

Brad gets home.
We've already moved into deeper shade
as we sit on chairs in an outside room.
Brad agrees with our assessment;
it is particularly hot,
even for Brisbane.

He looks it up:
34 feels like 38.
That's Celcius,
translated that's 93.2 feels like 100.4,
Fahrenheit.

We consider if the shade under the trees
might be cooler than under a man made roof.
We pick up our chairs and move.

We sit in wet bikinis
talking about all the things
with half wet towels loosely draped around us.

A couple of hours after she leaves
I see my face in the mirror.
I'm burnt.
Silly me
You'd think at 41 I'd know better.

We head to bed.
It's still hot.
I check the weather:
the "feels like" temperature is still over 30'C.
The temperature isn't due to drop below 27
all night long.

Oooft, it's going to be another one of those nights.

I go to bed near naked.
I ponder again what it would take to sleep with no sheet.
I bring my new favourite friend to bed with me:
a wet face cloth.
I drap it over the light sheet that's covering my body
I pray the combination of fan on high
plus wet cloth
plus light sheet
plus windows and curtains wide open
will be enough.

I meditate and ask for sleep to greet me.

Photo by Brad, my darling man, aka @new.things.