Texas heat and the great, fiery bronze orb in the sky drives us into long siestas these August days. Temperatures in the 100s bleaches the hair on my horses. Star, my big paint gelding, loses the black color on his head to a color of creamed coffee and his browsing during the afternoon comes in bursts of fifteen or twenty minutes before he seeks the shade of the live oak trees in the corral.
I stay inside the house from about 11:00 a.m. until 6:00 p.m. At six o’clock I go down to the corral to feed the horses and my barn cat, Painters. But, most of the day is siesta, hiding from the heat. If this is a foretaste of global warming, we are all in for despairing afternoons. Buy misters to put on the porches, turn the air conditioners to 75 deg. F. and put the ceiling fans on medium speed. Put ice cubes in the bathtub with your daily wash.
The highest spot in Texas is in the Guadalupe Mountains of west Texas. Guadalupe Peak is 8,749 feet. Is it cool there? The National Park Service that manages the park does not report the temperature on their web page. I frankly can’t answer if it is cool or not on Guadalupe Peak. I’m busy taking my siesta in Mingus.
Sage to Meadow ~ Jack Matthews 