AGENDA

by

Michael Edwin Q.

I was not prepared for the sweltering, three-digit temperatures of a Texas summer. But then nothing could prepare you for such scalding weather other than a trip to Mars. During the month of August, the locals make no plans between the hours of twelve noon to six in the evening. A glass of iced tea is a common fixture held in their hands at all times, to be sipped on at constant one hundred and twenty second intervals. Brown is the dominating color. Everything once green has had the life cooked out of it.

I was a young man when I first moved to Texas, but still the August heat wore me down. I was working at, of all places, a foundry. We lived on salt tablet, trying to retain as much body moisture as possible.

It was a Friday in mid August, I came home from work. It was six o’clock but still ridiculously hot. Which is why I was surprised to see my next door neighbor mowing his lawn.

“So it’s not just Mad Dogs and Englishmen, it’s Texans too,” I said over the property dividing fence.

 “What did you say?” Paul asked as he turned off his mower.

In his right hand, instead of the usual can of beer, was a coffee mug.

“What are drinking?” I asked.

“Hot coffee,” he shouted back. “Best thing for you in this heat, it brings your body temperature down, so you can stand the heat.”

“You’re crazy,” I hailed back. “Where’d you hear that?”

“I read it off the side of a coffee can.”

“Forget that,” I said. “I’m going inside and have a beer.”

Paul took another sip of hot coffee and turned his mower back on.

An hour later, I was on my third beer. I leaned on the window unit and looked out. I watched the ambulance come and take Paul away.

I laughed, “Hot coffee…in August…in Texas…indeed!”

I learned my lesson early in life.

“Never believe anyone who has an agenda.”

END