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   NOBUNAGA🇯🇵🏯_夏樹蒼依 (japan_nobunaga@bird.makeup)'s status on Monday, 15-Jun-2026 06:59:18 JST NOBUNAGA🇯🇵🏯_夏樹蒼依

   USA. Summer. It is 95 degrees outside, and I am shivering inside a sandwich shop.

   I have discovered how Americans forge strong souls.

   Outside, the sun is trying to kill everyone. Inside this small restaurant, it is winter. My breath does not fog, but it is thinking about it. A man near me is eating a cold sandwich while wearing a jacket. In summer. Indoors.

   In Japan we would simply turn it down. Americans do not turn it down. And now I understand them better than they understand themselves.

   This cold is not an accident. This cold is a gift.

   The owner has built, inside his shop, a second season. He invites you in from the brutal heat and hands you the one thing the sun has denied you all day: a reason to be cold. To endure it is to be tempered. You walk in soft and sweating. You walk out sharp and clear, a slightly stronger person than you were.

   So I did not complain. I removed my outer layer and offered it to the woman at the next table, who was hugging herself. She said, "Oh, no, I'm fine, thank you." She was not fine. Her lips were blue. But she, too, understood the training. She would not break first. I respected her deeply.

   The owner asked if everything was okay.

   "It is perfect," I said, through my teeth, which were chattering. "Thank you for the winter."

   He said, "...I can turn the AC down if you want?"

   I told him no. A man does not ask the mountain to be shorter.

   I stayed two hours. I ordered a hot coffee to survive. Then a second one, to hold. By the end I could no longer feel my hands, but my spirit had never been clearer.

   So now, on the hottest days, I seek out the coldest rooms. I sit. I shiver. I sharpen.

   And when I finally step back out into the summer heat, and it wraps around me like a warm bath, I feel it.

   Reborn.

   A man who has survived the winter, in August, indoors, for the price of a sandwich.

   • KeepTakingTheSoma likes this.
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     KeepTakingTheSoma (keeptakingthesoma@spinster.xyz)'s status on Monday, 15-Jun-2026 07:00:36 JST KeepTakingTheSoma

     in reply to
     @japan_nobunaga This is the thing I will never understand about the USA.
     When it is lovely and hot, AC is deployed to reduce the temperature to the point at which if this were the actual seasonal temperature we would put the heating on.
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     LostInCalifornia (lostincalifornia@spinster.xyz)'s status on Monday, 15-Jun-2026 16:37:36 JST LostInCalifornia

     in reply to

     • KeepTakingTheSoma

     @KeepTakingTheSoma @japan_nobunaga Most buildings don't have adequate natural ventilation.

     Usually, a commercial AC is set at 72F (22.2C). That's balmy, but feels icy when you walk in from the desert heat. Remember, if you leave a car in the desert sun, you can cook a roast beef inside.

     Enviros suggest 78F (25.5C) in the summer; 68F (20C) in the winter. More or less what I aim for, but I haven't turned the AC on yet this year.

     KeepTakingTheSoma likes this.