Ham Porter Understands This Post

 It's summertime. To most people, that means two to three months worth of exhilarating fun in the sun with loads of water festivities, vacations, trips to the beach, weekends camped out under the stars with bellies full of s'mores, backyard cook-outs, and way too many Oompa Loopmas walking around disguised as teenage girls. But you see, I live in a place called Texas. In case you've never been to Texas, this is what summer is like:

Texas summertime heat = Have a cookie while you melt.

And that's the honest truth. Ev.er.y.YEAR!!!

Winters, on the other hand, are perfectly pleasant; not too bitter, and not too unwintery. Some days it's only 60 degrees. This suits me particularly well because I'd rather be cold than hot any day. My philosophy is that when you're cold, you can always add layer after layer of clothing or blankets until you reach your desired degree of warmth; but if you're hot, you can only strip so much away until you're down to either your skivvies or your skin; and either way you're not only publicly indecent, but if you're still hot, what else can you do besides douse yourself in water?? So any place that makes you want to peel off your skin can only be one level above hell, and that's a little too close for comfort in my opinion.

My personal heat tolerance is negative sixteen, so every year as April draws to a close and May creeps in like a thing that creeps, I settle into my annual feeling of dread over this measure of unbearable heat, and every year I feel this dread just a little bit more than the year before. And for the record, I'm a very laid back person, so it takes a lot to irritate me. But I hate to sweat, I hate burning my hands on my steering wheel, I hate feeling like all my makeup is dribbling down my chin after merely unloading my groceries from the car, I hate that my ten pounds of hair must maintain a perpetual ponytail status so that I don't die of a heat stroke, I hate that spending an entire day outside will inevitably end in a killer migraine and a heavy dose of self-loathing, and I hate that I can wake up in the middle of the night feeling like a menopausal woman in a bakery oven even with two fans pointed straight at me blowing full-blast. To me, this is an inventive form of torture.

But most of all, even more than sweat on my upper lip, I REALLY hate the traditional wardrobe of a Texas summer. That is to say, I hate the obligation to expose so much of my skin that I have to submit myself to feeling like a hippo in a bikini contest just to survive going outside for more than two minutes. Not because there are paparazzi hiding out in my shrubbery at all times and I must look my trendy-best for the tabloids; but because that is literally how we Texans have to dress if we don't want to bake like a toasted cheese-it. In fact, I'm pretty sure that if it weren't for Texans, clothing manufacturers would not make tank tops, shorts, or swimsuits in any women's size above a 12. But since Texas heat is best friends with an intense humidity factor, all the heavyweights are forced to clad themselves just as scantily as all the skinny-mini's do. To the person who is not naturally inclined to dress in this manner (AKA me), the level of psychological degradation that accompanies this necessity is not only dire but menacing, and it makes me so depressed that I just want to forever sit on the couch in cotton underwear and eat a crate of cookies and sob into a milkshake.

It is THIS, more than anything, that deprives me the pleasure of looking forward to summer each year -- because I am apart of the unfortunate population of chubsters lumbering about with chaffed thighs and sweat under our butt cheeks. I'm smaller this year than I've been in quite a few summers, but that hasn't had much effect on the square footage of cottage cheese dimples and stretch mark graffiti tainting my otherwise slammin' body (just kidding! *Snort*).

To make summertime cosmopolitan matters worse, everyone expects the Snow White's of the world to transform into sun goddesses with glistening, ethereal skin that looks oh-so-soft-and-touchable. In the past, I always succumbed to the pressure to turn myself into a Bahama Mama every summer just to sugarcoat the fact that I was (gasp!) overweight. I would spend God knows how much money on three or four months worth of tanning memberships at a salon, and I would go almost every single day to ensure that I got my money's worth. I even recall last June that a co-worker approached me and said, "Um, Amber? Do you plan on continuing tanning throughout the rest of the summer? Because you're getting too dark. It's not very attractive, and you should stop." (Thanks, "friend". Love you, too, right? I had to take a poll from the rest of my co-workers just to make sure I wasn't turning orange or something. Which, I wasn't. Unless they lied........0_0)

But last year, I had two friends under the age of 30 have melanoma cut off of their bodies, and they were both very fair-skinned like me and had frequented tanning beds in past summers. So this year, I vowed to my dermatologist that I would no longer make use of tanning beds, and I have no plans to take sun exposure lightly under other circumstances. I feel confident in this decision; but while I may be sitting pretty in forty years with half the wrinkles as my Crypt Keeper friends, in the meantime, I'm now a hail-damaged chunky monkey AND I'm pale as a ginger.



So here it is, 1,000 degrees hotter than Hades' hot tub outside, and you've got a stateful of fat people who can't cover up their fat without committing suicide. On top of that, you've got fat people who can't get a tan to look halfway decent while not covering up their fat without potentially giving themselves cancer. Fellow muffin tops understand and feel for each other, but the skinny-mini's of the state have no sympathy for our fat lard. I've lost count of the times I have heard [insert stereotype here] people make snarky comments about the way somebody was dressed and how they needed to "cover that up", and that "nobody wants to see that". Geez, dude, cut us some slack here! Just because we don't bench our body weight in steroids doesn't mean we don't have feelings. Trust me, we do; we eat them all the time. Albeit, I've been to Wal-Mart, and if you spend five minutes on this website, People of Wal-Mart, you, too, will know that there is certainly a right and wrong -- VERY wrong -- way to dress your blubbery behind. But I don't particularly care to see some guy's forest of back hair any more than you care to see my gooshy tooshie, nor do I care to see some girl's ta-ta's hanging out of her top or her tiny hiney smiling at me from behind, so we're all at an impasse if you ask me. I say don't hate on me, and I won't hate on you, and we can all be stifling hot together! Like buddies, we is.

Can you imagine why I have such animosity toward summer? And you say to me, (cue the drama): "Woe to Amber! Such nobility, such grace! How doth thee bear such distress? Be there no relief from this torment???" And I sayeth to you: yes, but very little. Because yet another AWESOME trait about Texas summers is that toward the end of July at the very latest, all the pools and lakes feel like a warm bath. Literally. They aren't cool at ALL, and it's not even worth trying. So you're just stuck indoors with a misting fan, a Popsicle, and the occasional 30 seconds of leaning into the refrigerator between the milk and last night's leftovers unless you want to risk imminent death by leaving the house.

But since it's still early and not mind-numbingly, devastatingly, brain-fryingly hot out just yet, I find myself in a tremor of excitement over the fact that my family bought one of those ghetto above-ground inflatable swimming pools this summer so that my mom and my nephew, who is two and a half, can have a little bit of fun for some portion of the summer break while my mom is out of school. Be forewarned that me and my big, white bohunkus will be basking in the convectional sunshine as much as possible throughout the next few months, so quick, warn the neighbors! Shut the blinds, pull the curtains, and don't leave the house with your eyes open or you just might get your corneas accidentally burned out by the sight of me in a swimsuit.

So, back to my opening statement. Summertime? Fun?? I think not. My idea of seasonal fun is sweatpants and a hoodie that's three sizes too big. Give me flannel pajamas and now we're talkin'! Hot cocoa and warm beef stew? You're speaking my language. Not being able to leave the house without a sweater? Winter, I am yours!! But this....THIS....cellulite roasted and coated in bug spray?? Ew. You telling me I will pass out from heat exhaustion if I wear so much as a pair of blue jeans outside until October? You lost me.

I leave you, my friends, with this:

-Amber

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