# Re: Memoir - Outsiders Part 8

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Posted by Zonie on May 12, 2021 at 07:43:16

In Reply to: Memoir - Outsiders Part 8 posted by Pete on May 09, 2021 at 02:08:15:

The flat in which I lived in Tucson from 1989 to 1992 was an old adobe house that had been reinforced and divided into a duplex. A relative of the owner said it had been built in 1898. It had no air conditioning but had an evaporative cooler. This worked better than air conditioning in May and June but was far less effective when the humidity climbed during the southeast monsoon. At one point I had to do without it, as it caught fire. I extinguished the fire and unplugged it, but it was three days before the landlord could get it repaired. I actually was able to sleep, although the thermometer in the flat registered 95°F. I did have some peculiar dreams about having conferences with the devil (though I didn't remember what we discussed), and when I woke, I went to the lavatory sink, turned on the tap, cupped my hands under it and drank copious quantities of water that way, not bothering to get my drinking glass from the kitchen.

More instructive were the accounts of my sister-in-law's grandfather. He had moved to Phoenix in 1933 to harvest cotton and then left to join the Navy in 1936, which he considered a better opportunity. In those days there was no air conditioning, so I asked how people coped. He said that during the day they would swim in the irrigation ditches. It wasn't hygienic at all, as they had dead horses and mules in the ditches, but it was cooling. He said that in the evening, they would wet their bed sheets, wrap the sheets around them and sleep on the porch. These days few people would dare sleep on a porch. I suppose people trusted each other more back then.

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