Georgia Summer vs. Maryland Summer: What Nobody Tells You About Moving North

Something happened to me last Saturday that I need to talk about.

I did yardwork. In July. Outside. For the entire day.

And I did not die.

I want you to understand what a statement that is. I spent the better part of four decades in Georgia, where July yardwork is not a leisure activity — it is a hostage situation. You go outside because the grass has gotten to a length that the neighbors are starting to talk, and you do what must be done, and you come back inside looking like you swam the English Channel in your clothes, and you sit directly under the fan like a golden retriever, and you do not move for forty-five minutes. That is Georgia July yardwork. It is a rescue operation. You rescue the yard, and then someone has to rescue you.

Last Saturday, I was outside from mid-morning until The Woman Who Shares My Name told me it might be a good idea to have dinner. I came inside when it was time to eat, not when my body staged a revolt, not when my vision went a little sideways, not when I started questioning the choices that led me to home ownership.

Maryland, I owe you an apology for taking so long to get here.

Let me paint you a picture of July in Georgia, because I don’t think people who haven’t lived it fully appreciate what it is.

It is not merely hot. Hot is a temperature. Georgia in July is a condition. You walk out the door at seven in the morning — seven, before the sun has even really committed to the day — and the air wraps around you like a wet wool blanket that has been stored in a dryer. You don’t step into Georgia July heat. It absorbs you. Within five seconds of leaving your house, you are damp in places you didn’t know could be damp, and you feel approximately ten pounds heavier than you did when you were standing in your kitchen.

The humidity in Georgia in July is a physical presence. It’s like a big burly fifteen-foot being that just wants to snuggle you and hang on you for hours.

And it does not leave. That is the thing people don’t understand about Georgia heat. It is not a visitor. It moves in. It is hot when you wake up. It is hot when you go to bed. It is hot at two in the morning when you get up for a glass of water and you think, surely, surely it has cooled off by now — and it has not. It has not cooled off even slightly. The night air in Georgia in July is just the day air with the lights off. Don’t believe me, just try camping in the summer.

And then it rains.

Now, a reasonable person might think: rain. Rain is cool. Rain is refreshing. Rain is nature’s way of giving you a break.

Not in Georgia. Not in July.

When it rains in Georgia in July, the water hits the ground — which has been baking at approximately the surface temperature of a cast iron skillet since April — and it does not cool anything. It evaporates. Immediately. It turns into steam. The rain does not lower the temperature. The rain becomes the temperature. You go from hot and dry to hot and wet without passing through any stage that could be described as relief.

Opening a window in Georgia in July is not a thing people do. It is not a thing people consider. If you cracked a window in Georgia in July, you would not get a breeze. You would get a warm, wet exhalation from the outdoors, like the state itself was breathing on you, and every mosquito within a quarter mile would immediately identify the opening and begin organizing. Georgia mosquitoes do not sleep. They do not take breaks. They do not observe weekends or holidays. They are out there at midnight, at three in the morning, at dawn, fully committed, deeply motivated, and personally offended that you exist.

Sitting on the porch with your morning coffee in Georgia in July sounds like a lovely idea right up until you try it. You get out there, you’ve got your mug, you’re ready for a peaceful moment, and within four minutes your coffee is no longer hot because the air around it is hotter than the coffee, and you have been bitten six times, and you are sweating through a shirt you put on clean eleven minutes ago, and you go back inside and you sit in front of the air conditioning vent and you think: why do people live here. (It’s the food, by the way. The food is amazing.)

Back to Maryland. Last week I had three mornings where I either sat on my balcony or opened the windows and let the air come through the house.

Three mornings. In July.

I sat outside with my coffee and the coffee stayed hot and nothing bit me and there was a beautiful breeze, and I just sat there like a man who had been told his whole life that the sky was green and had just, for the first time, looked up.

This is what seasons are. This is what books talk about when they describe a cool summer evening. I had read about it. I had not believed it.

I believe it now. I know what you’re thinking… “Just wait ’til winter, Georgia Boy.” But that is another column for another time.

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