I only have vague memories of summer when I was a child living in New York City, but I remember it being hot. My family eventually moved to California’s temperate Central Coast when I was a tween, effectively escaping the extreme temperatures of the city with a white flag flying high, but I was in for a real treat when I returned to the city years later and experienced NYC summers as an adult.
For a variety of common reasons, I struggled through several summers with neither central air conditioning—it still blows my mind that new buildings in Bushwick now offer this—nor an AC unit. My first AC-less summers were borne out of financial instability; I simply couldn’t afford to buy a unit and pay for an increased electric bill. The next couple of summers I literally couldn’t install a window unit because I lived in a bedroom that had bars in the window. Even when I found myself in a financially stable position, living in a room in which I could have installed an AC unit… I resisted getting one.
Through those AC-less years, I realized that something happens to you when you’ve lived in NYC long enough: You become very, very stubborn. I could have done something to change my AC status before I did, but I willed myself forward, feeling stronger for finding ways to survive a perpetually hot and sweaty lifestyle. And I was pretty damn proud of myself for it.
