Summer Side of Life

As a teacher, the summer months bring a much needed and hard-earned extended vacation (for which we do not get paid, as is a common misconception). I love nothing more than early morning walks on the beach with my Boston terrier, Rocky. Sipping coffee on the porch in silence or chattering with family and friends as the day eases from fog to light. I love the many visitors that come calling, affording me the opportunity to introduce others to my favorite spots along the rocky coastline of New England. I welcome evenings spent around the fire pit with friends and neighbors or a sunset visit to the beach to listen to the ocean waves and watch the sun drop into the horizon. I wait, eagerly, for my favorite time which is late at night. I am on the porch once again, coffee in hand, as the sea breeze from the Atlantic winds through the screens making it just cold enough to be ensconced in an oversized, well worn, and cozy hooded sweatshirt. I pile my hair on my head, perch my glasses on the end of my nose, and power up my laptop. My coastal world is drifting to sleep, and I am finally able to write late into the night, surrounded by the crip, salt air. 

As idyllic as summer can be, there is a significant portion of the season I refer to with minimal affection: The Hotter Than Hell. This is the point of the summer where literally everything goes up in flames. 

My curly hair resists the siren song of my flat iron, and no amount of hair product can tame my mane, rendering me looking like a close cousin of an alpaca. My perfectly coiffed hair is reduced to being yanked back into a ponytail or messy bun or shoved under a baseball hat. I am fastidious about my hair – and the hot, humid weather puts a damper on my mood. 

The worst is yet to come – for my poor, beleaguered, “plugged up by molds” ears are also under attack.  

Much like my curly hair, my ears go positively wild. The insides of my ears instantly transform into flames of fire gloriously flicking at the already irritated skin that has barely rebounded from The Pollinating. The already unbearable level of itchiness has now dialed up to impossible to ignore and nearly intolerable. The clear fluid that was present during allergy season, has now increased in volume, is discolored, and often emits an unpleasant odor. I continuously monitor for the presence of ear infections, and so far I have been fortunate to have avoided them for many, many years. 

I try to relieve the discomfort as best as I can by employing a few home remedies that have been in place since I was a child including blotted tissues and leaving my hearing aids out for a bit, but nothing soothes the itchiness quite like a vigorous onslaught of cotton swabs. I recognize that inserting anything “smaller than your elbow” into your ear is quite frowned upon by experts. I don’t care. The handful of Q-tips that I grab with alarming frequency is the only tool that provides even a modicum of temporary relief. I grab those swabs and attack my canals with vigor. I instantly transform into one of the seven dwarfs from “Snow White” working in the gem mines – digging away in my battered ears with my version of a tiny shovel. 

To quell the discharge, I grab a face cloth and run it under the coldest water I can tolerate to try and stop the weeping of my ear canals. A temporary, short-lived relief which inevitably leads to the slimy, cooling and understated powers of hydrocortisone cream. This magical poultice is applied in a thin coating to the delicate membranes of my ears, magically moisturizing the irritation and providing near instant calm and relief to my tired, tortured ears. The flip side of this is the newly deposited piles of goo that have taken up residence inside my ears, thus rendering it impossible for me to place my hearing aids in for the remainder of the day, hence why this routine is saved for nighttime. The employment of the cream is necessary, but very difficult for my heightened sensory system to tolerate. It is akin to moistening some play dough, dropping some slippery dish soap on the surface and tucking that snuggly into your ears. Gross, yet necessary. 

It may be summertime, but the livin’ isn’t easy!