This summer’s heat has me asking, “How did we survive without air conditioning?” I remember fans blowing across blocks of ice, and water-based air conditioners for cars. The first worked a bit, and the second hardly at all. In our recent heat waves, some have died from heat stroke and dehydration. We did generally survive in past high heat conditions, but what physical joy there is to come into a cool room out of the blistering temperatures!
Some people seem to thrive in the warmest conditions. Personally, I prefer the 55o to 75oF. A sweater in the morning and short sleeves in the afternoon seems ideal. An open window at night with a cooling breeze seems just about perfect. Having spent my growing up years in South Dakota, that was not my experience. Winters that can reach 20o to 30oF below zero and summers which can reach over 100oF are a long way from the ideal. The amazing thing is that human beings live in areas that are far from comfortable and thrive under the most difficult of climate conditions.
Apparently God created us humans with a great capacity for adaptation. Do you suppose that our minds have the same kind of capacity for adaptation? The modern fast pace of change might call that into question, but in one lifetime, my Grandmother traveled to North Dakota in a wagon and lived to see a human being walk on the moon. Maybe we are more flexible than we have been led to believe. Perhaps God built into us the capacity to survive and prosper whatever new situations life presents to us. As much as we protest the fast pace of change, perhaps it is what we were designed for.