Modesto is Burning

I was in Modesto the other day, in the heat, in hell. "Hell" used loosely sometimes, but this time for real. Living in Modesto must be like living in hell, or as close as one may want to be. So, yes, I was there, along with three other friends. We actually had to play music in this heat, and practically during the hottest part of the day. I should have been more used to the heat. I come from the desert, the high desert just North of Los Angeles. Modesto is about 4 hours North of Lancaster, my home town, but certainly not the town I call "home" anymore. Many days and many seasons have passed since my time in the desert, and though I've endured relentless summer heat in my youth, I can no longer handle it. I recall skateboarding for hours in the "dead" of summer. My friends and I were pretty much unfazed by the heat, occasionally taking a break in the shade or maybe going to someone's house to cool off a bit. But we were always back on the black-topped, and blistering streets. Hats were secured and we wore big, baggy pants. Trucks were wobbly and loose, heads dizzy and dehydrated, and if you were to fall the pain and torture of skin sticking to molten surface would assure future balance and articulation. There was no way around the heat, and we eventually became used to it. But now, no, I am not "used" to it. I am old and the sun kills old people. Playing music in Modesto was similar to skating in Lancaster. But this time I had a choice; I chose to leave at the end of the day, unlike the past; stuck in a basin, melting in the sun, searching for feeble shade, dry-heaves, slurred speech, wrinkles around the eyes, reddened skin, endless sweat, and unrelenting days in and out of some surreal landscape littered with the most peculiar people suffering from the hottest weather imaginable.