A week or so ago I went to a birthday party for a one-year-old. I work from home now, and my house is Air conditioned. The A/C went out in my car. I've been meaning to have it serviced but things change when you are home all the time. It used to be when I made an appointment for my car, I would schedule for after work on one of the garage's late evenings. This way, I could stop after work and go to the appointment before I went home. I HATE to leave the house after I come home. I'm one of those people who stop off and do little or big errands on the way home from work. But once I'm home, I'm home.
This Saturday, I step out of my house at 2:30 p.m. and back into my house at 6:30 p.m. For four hours I was in 93ยบ F heat. When I am not used to it. The baby above is my nephew's child. My nephew works outside doing landscaping every work day and outside work and activities on the week-ends. And he has not one ounce of fat on his body. I am a different story. I won't go into detail about all the extra ounces of fat I have on my body, suffice to say - a good bit.
My older sister (the child's grandmother) was there and she was overly warm also. My nephew put a fan on each of us, but it just blew hot air at us. We caught up and watched the wee one open his presents and enjoy his "smash" cake. I can honestly say (since I found out about this tradition of giving a baby a small cake all of their own to smash, grab, squish and eat on their first birthday) I've never witnessed a wee one eat ALL of their smash cake. Until that day. I admit, a good bit fell down between his legs and the high chair so perhaps it wasn't all that bad. I kept saying "Please give him a drink of water or something." It fell on deaf ears.
My plan for that day (before I found out my A/C had quit in my car) was to go to this birthday party, go shopping for a bit and meet up with my daughter and her beau later as his band was playing at a pub in that vicinity. This was an hour from home, so instead of driving all the way back home (after the party) and then back into this area (for the band show), I decided to kill time shopping around. It had been a while since I had been to the stores in that area. It did not happen that way.
After this birthday party and getting in my hot car, I stopped at the crossroad. Turn left to go home or turn right to continue on until 11 p.m. I couldn't do it. I headed home. What made my mind up was not how hot and tired I was. I figured shopping in a cool air-conditioned store might bring my energy back. It was my legs. I have been fighting eczema on my legs for a long while now. And they get especially irritated when my legs get hot. I don't wear shorts due to the eczema. I was in agony. So, home it was and I skipped out on the band show. It didn't even occur to me that the band may have played outside that night. It was inside, but if I had decided to stay and met them and they played outside - ugh! I would have been miserable again.
My daughter is 30 years old. I remember her first birthday party very well. I was not aware of the tradition of the "smash" cake yet, so she did not get one. It was a small party with just a few family members. I had a yellow duck on her cake. I'll have to dig up that photo and take a picture of it and post it. Or, I could get my scanner out of the garage and set it up.
One strange incident (I thought) was a girl that came to the party sat at my table. I'd say she was twenty-something. Maybe in her early 30's. She was dressed like a lumberjack. No lie! She had boots on, blue jeans, a top and one of those red-checked lumberjack long-sleeved shirts on over her top. I said a couple of words to her, she acknowledged, but mostly she was quiet and did not say much. I did not see her perspire and she never complained about the heat. She did have her hair up in a half pony-tail/bun.
Ah, I almost forgot. The title of this post. What DOES the future hold for little ones like this one-year old? What suffering will they go through because of our greed and acts of entitlement? Our shallow, inconsiderate exploitation of the world? So far my daughter has decided not to have children. We all know that can change in the blink of an eye. Then I won't only wonder, I will worry. About my grandchild and what the future holds for them.