Periodically, my family will drop in to make sure I haven’t gone too far upriver. Oh, they claim it’s to visit and have fun in Prague, but then they ask me questions like ‘what day is today?’ or ‘do you remember dad’s birthday?’ and I know they’re doing a cognitive screening for my mom. We used to include ‘who is the president’ in these orientation assessments, but we figured if the president himself can’t answer that question then why should we have to?
This time it’s my sister. We meet Thursday morning and chat easily about our strange family. We then talk about food. By late morning, she slips in the occasional question about our old street address (nailed it) and what our first cat’s name was (there’s debate here) and she sounds it out with one on what condition our great grandmother’s golden retriever had (trick question, she didn’t trust dogs).
Once the questions are over, we can enjoy our most vile attack campaign: the heat. See, not only are Prague, the central Bohemian region, and parts of Saxony being bombarded by two Galeones, they are being bombarded by two Galeones, a heatwave, and two Galeones in a heatwave. This is fair to nobody. My people do not do well in the heat. Though, admittedly, this is a source of some confusion, as a good chunk of our little clan hails from southern Italy and from Sicily, two places not exactly known for their brisk and chilly weather.
Nevertheless, we can’t handle it. Each of our homes is a testament to cooling down overheated people with short legs: fans, air conditioners, open windows, unused heaters, heating radiators that act as bookshelves. Without these, we are irritable and unproductive. It’s no accident that my dad’s uncles were all sent to fight in the European Theater during WWII. Had they been sent to the Pacific there’s no telling what language we’d all be speaking right now.
So it is with some universal irony that we have various plans that include moving around outside and we are doing it in a country that looks upon air conditioning as the third greatest tragedy of the 20th century.
We do two days in Dresden, where we find solace in outdoor pubs and big churches that block out the meddling sun. But it’s on our way to the little town of Kutná Hora that the monster within me rears its overheated head. We sit in a cabin across from three people whose combined age would bring us to the Mesozoic Era. It’s a one-hour trip that is consistently interrupted by stoppages and sitting still under the baking sun in a hot metal box with slanted window gaps the width of a slice of New York pizza. My sister closes her and hums lightly as she meditates her way to Kutná Hora. Burke is also calm – she’s off from work and nobody is asking her anything.
It’s me who has the trouble. I grumble and groan. The sweat drips into my shirt and down my face. My hair is splattered against my forehead. I feel the judgmental eyes of the conductor on me. (I mean, all he’s said to me so far was ‘good morning’ and ‘I love your dog’, so what kind of sociopath is this?) I go into the hallway with the other people overheating in the cabin – my dog. She and I stand out in the narrow walkway and she pants for a while before plopping down and resting her belly against the cool floor. She’s soon in heaven and I am slightly cooled. A bunch of young guys in the cabin next to us are hooting and hollering. I suppose this is only natural – they are young, after all, and probably have visible abs and eyes that work without equipment. But still, I wonder, how can you all be so happy in this heat.
My sister and Burke realize my misery and soothe my bespackled feathers with talks of lunch and beer. I run a towel over my head and cool with gratitude. After the train ride, the twenty-minute walk to the first site forces Dr. Jekyll out again. I grumble and I think I might even shake my fist at the sun, because screw that G-type main-sequence star and all his yellow dwarf friends. As much of the rest of the day takes place in a restaurant, the police didn’t have to get called on me.
While waiting for the train back to Prague, I grumble again. See, this is a local – not express – so while our morning train took over an hour because of delays, this one will take an hour and twenty minutes before any delays can be factored in.
But then some amazing things happen. 1. This train is early. 2. This train is empty. 3. This train has air conditioning. We take the 4-spot group seats and two women and a little girl take the ones on the other side. Cool air is blowing at us from all directions. The conductor is kind and has a kind face. (He says to me ‘give me your tickets. Quickly!’ and ‘don’t think about putting your feet on the seat’ – what a mensch!) I am jolly and happy and making plans for the rest of my life. The woman next to me looks a little sad and I wonder how she can be so unhappy in these glorious conditions. I think I begin humming. This is the best ride of my whole life and I once rode in a Batmobile.
We’re nearly in Prague when my sister leans across the seats.
‘Dame. What was our usual Christmas dinner?’
‘Ravioli and meatballs. Duh? How did you forget that?’ I make a face to Burke.
‘And which town did we usually go to at the Jersey Shore?’
‘Oh, uh…’
I see what’s happening. I answer the next few questions and subdue my mood until we reach home safely and our next air conditioning experience.
