Akrasia, a story for everyone

I don’t recall when I first heard this story, and in fact I can’t even say for sure who told me it, but most likely it was my father or my mother. My grandmother wasn’t much for stories, unless they were about putting flowers in the urns on Memorial day. Nobody else ever took the time to tell me stories. That gives you an idea of my childhood. If I wanted stories, pretty or otherwise, I had to make them up for myself. Maybe that’s why I decided to become a writer. That also means that my stories are for me, so I write for myself. That’s not being selfish, because I share them after I create them, as you can see. Plus, consider that if I didn’t have an outlet for my thoughts and feelings, the world wouldn’t be a pretty place.

Not that it’s pretty now, given all the wars we humans have gotten ourselves into, but I prefer not to add to it.

The story I feel impelled to tell today happened in an unnamed place at an unspecified time. The determining factor of the events was that it took place on the hottest day of the year. What follows is the reproduction of an older family member’s words, as close as I can recall. If anything here was made up, it was not me. I’m just the messenger, as the old line goes.

It was stifling hot, even for summer. It was at least 120 degrees, maybe 125. There was disagreement among folks as to the exact temperature. The town felt like an oven, was an oven. Nobody wanted to do anything, including lifting a finger. If they just breathed carefully, lightly, they might make it to next day, when surely the thermometer would drop, right? Right.

Some people were stoic, but others not so much. Some of these people, the ones suffering the most discomfort, which caused considerable mood swings, had accepted an invitation days ago to go to Dana’s house. Now keeping their promise could be hazardous to their health; they could melt. It was that hot. Maybe there was a resemblance to Dante’s Inferno, even. Just the idea of transferring their humid bodies to Dana’s house made them all think of the plain of burning sands in one of the regions of Hell.

Nevertheless, they were friends after all, and responsible. Nobody could accuse them of akrasia, lacking in mental fortitude. They all arrived, wearing towels over their shoulders to sop up the sweat, car tires constantly having to unglue themselves from the blacktop. The sky was as purple and indigo as a sky can get when it’s not announcing a pending storm. Nearly all the flowers were weeping, especially the yellow rudbeckias and coneflowers, which seemed to be apologizing on their knees for being little suns when the one high in the sky was enough to struggle with. 

All the guests were considerate and had brought their own beverages BYOB, as they used to say - so as not to impose excessively on Dana’s hospitality. (Although some guests did resent the event not being called off by its organizers, given the circumstances.) Resigned to their circumstances, the persons arriving carried their drinks - kombucha, vitamin water, iced tea - in backpacks or duffel bags. However, when they were greeted by a hand-written sign that warned them: "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here", they hesitated. What was going on? Dana’s sign was a clear reference to Dante’s work, but this was no time for literary tricks. It literally felt like an inferno in the poor little town. They didn’t need to be reminded. 

Everybody bravely entered, despite the warning, because they were more eager to enter Dana’s house with its air conditioning than they were to debate the seven ominous words. And in fact, Dana had prepared comfortable seats, nooks, or cushions for everybody. It had been a lot of work and required good space management, but at last everyone was tucked in somewhere, attached to a beverage container and drowsily thinking it was nice they’d all come, because in fact, misery really did love company. And the air conditioning worked properly.

Until it didn’t. Gradually the reality of their situation sank in, as faces began to melt, towels no longer had dry areas to mop up sweat, and the indigo sky had blanched: it had a haze that looked like snow, a whiteout. Dana, ever the good host, noticed the many rivulets at once, and acted, giving an explanation:

“It seems the air conditioning has failed. I am so, so sorry, but maybe there’s a solution.”

“Certainly you’re not suggesting we go hop in the hot tub?” Somebody commented gruffly.

“Surely you don’t expect us to drag ourselves back to our cars to drive to the beach, or home for a cold shower? I don’t even have cold water now.” Complained another.

Dana did not stop smiling and then proposed an activity for the captive audience. They were all to spend half an hour rustling up memories from winters during childhood. They were also welcome to utilize quotes about cold weather from poems or stories or novels they’d read. When they had done that, everybody would present what they had gathered from the past. Skeptical, the guests agreed. The presentations were often quite funny and some were shared experiences. “Stopping by woods on a snowy evening” by Frost was the hands-down winner as far as poems were concerned. 

The theme of cold was followed by several more. Some of these were: trees, hearts, table cloths, cursive, and why X is my favorite color. Nobody resisted the exercises, but they also had their copious supplies of water and were dutifully following the request to move as little as possible in order to conserve strength and to avoid sunstroke. Gradually the temperature began to recede from the higher region of the thermometer and then the air conditioning suddenly started working again. 

People looked at each other, some with confused expressions on their faces, some with hints of fear. Why had it gotten so cold all of a sudden? The new low temperature was causing them to shiver. The majority requested the air conditioning be turned off.

Not long after, the activities proposed by Dana wrapped up and the guests began to file out. They no longer seemed so beleaguered; the heat was simply heat, and the mind was more than a temperature gauge. They were more tolerant of the range of degrees. They were able to disconnect from the pacifier of the water bottle. They were comfortable and didn’t whine now.

Some said it was a miracle. They talked about it at church and on the streets or in coffee shops. It made them feel glorious, which wasn’t a bad thing even if not exactly true.

Dana knew otherwise. The faulty air conditioning had really just been a discreetly flipped switch. The cooling device then had been creativity. Dana had used it to flip another switch, the one that brings the enormous room of the mind and of e.e. cummings out of the dark of everyday. Making rooms with words, Dana knew, was the remedy for almost everything.

Yes, making rooms to explore, not war to decimate.

I agree with Dana. Make stories, not war. Make rooms to live in comfortably, not melt away feeling miserable and sweaty.

Invite your friends over often, no matter the weather.

In a world of drones and nuclear weapons, be a Dana.

PS: I still don’t know where this story came from. Maybe I made it up and it wasn’t more than 110 degrees that day.