The backyard thermometer creeps up past a hundred. The weather app said it would be 95 today, but it’s always 10 to 15 degrees off. Not a margin of error, but something more sinister. This spot used to be hilly grasslands, used for cattle grazing, covered in native oak trees. The trees were razed, the hills flattened, clusters of houses built two stories high. Native plants went into the front yards, drought tolerant for the warming California weather. The replacement trees haven’t grown into a leafy canopy yet and no shade is cast in our neighborhood.
We tried to fill the backyard with green, climbing clematis and tomato vines, jasmine, tomato plants and basil. But the neighbors put in hardscape, hot cement that super charges the summers.
The mercury bobs up again, the needle creeping to 120. I text a picture to a coworker who sends back an emoji expressing shock. He texts back: 134 is the highest temperature ever recorded, how can it be so hot?
We live in a heat island, I text back. I miss the coast, 35 miles away, where the weather is foggy and moist, and 45 degrees cooler.
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