Heatwaves & Forecasts

I listen to Aussie radio of a morning, while preparing die Lüdde’s breakfast. Like a good immigrant, I find ways to sneak my own culture into my home through artwork, classic children’s books, food and music. And really, really average breakfast radio. (It also has the added bonus of putting der Lüdde to sleep, which I would otherwise pay handsomely for.)

Anyway, one thing I have noticed over the past couple of weeks is the weather forecasts in Sydney correlate exactly, sometimes to the degree, with the weather forecasts in Kiel. There is talk of ‘rainy, chilly mornings’ and ‘evening showers’ and ‘tops of 20 degrees.’ Sometimes I have to stop making my coffee and check I am listening to a Sydney station, and have not slipped into some bizarre zone in which an Australian reads out the weather for Kiel. It seems, however, Sydney is having a rather summery winter. Or we are having a rather wintry summer. Or Sydney is having its normal August and we are having an absolute shocker.

The good news is, a Hitzewelle is coming. The bad news is, it’s two months too late. Summer, despite some truly love days, has been a bit of a bust. May held such promise, with some gloriously hot days. June was just lovely. July I am truly thankful I missed. And now here we are cracking out the sodding pashminas.

We have 9 days left of August, which means we have 9 days left until people start banging on about gemütlichkeit and changing leaves and ankle boots. The very thought makes me want to weep. I am not ready for gemütlichkeit and chilli hot chocolates and vowing to actually wear one of the numerous pairs of stockings I own. I am not ready for layering and my Übergangsjacke (actually, that reminds me, I need a new one) and I am certainly not ready for ankle boots. Or dark evenings. Or darker mornings. I pray the Hitzewelle is a cracker – long and relentless and hot. I want to feel like I am melting, I want the sand to be too hot to walk on, I want to eat ice blocks for dinner. And I want to let die Lüdde go nuts at a water pump in the playground just one more time. Then we can talk about changing bloody leaves.

With all of that being said, Sunday morning was just beautiful. Warm and sunny and fresh and filled with possibility. The possibility, as it turned out, of intermittent rain, thunderous skies, and some delightfully heavy evening showers. But we weren’t to know that when we skipped outside, exclaiming at the morning light. (Nor were we to know Monday would be a complete dud. I am sitting beside the window right now, glaring beadily outside.) So we went down to the water, wound up through the park, and generally felt really smug as That Family Who Take Really Long Sunday Morning Walks Wearing Sneakers. Obviously, later that afternoon, we were the family who arrives at the animal park and realises they have forgotten the pram, so decides not to disembark but leave the sleeping baby and drive to the beach, only to have the rain begin pissing down upon parking.

Bring on the Hitzewelle.

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