Growing up in Louisiana, in the summers before mass embrace of air conditioning, we had electric fans. The one in the kitchen sat on the counter. The blades turned, and the fan head swiveled back and forth with a quiet rhythmic buzz. If you faced the fan while it was on and went ‘ahhh…’, your voice was transformed into a funky vibrating sound that we kids found entertaining. If you got overheated, you stood in front of the fan for awhile until you cooled down.

At school, there were ceiling fans in some rooms. There were fans on stands with rotating heads. The first house I remember had an attic fan that circulated the air in the attic and house. It was loud!

My sister and I shared a room, and between the twin beds we placed a cylindrical floor fan. This was amusing too because the air current went upward, caught the underside of the sheets, and inflated them so that we were sleeping under airy domes, something like parachutes.

We left our windows open at night – screens kept out most of the insects although somehow we always ended up with June bugs under the light in the hallway. They made a kind of flapping noise when they fluttered up against the wall or floor.

Air conditioning for our family arrived in 1966. Somewhere along the way, we completely stopped opening the windows. It was either the heater or the AC that was on, always set at 73 degrees F. There was less experiencing the change in weather, no fresh scent from the pine trees just outside the house. When the house was renovated, somehow when the windows were painted, they were painted while closed and thus sealed shut. The windows wouldn’t open any more.

Before electricity, I don’t know how people managed the humid heat in Louisiana. I’m curious about this. In central Texas, there are old houses from the 1800s that have an open hallway running down the middle called a dog run. Having both ends open to the outdoors creates an air current that cools and provides fresh air to rooms on both sides of the run. Hanging damp cloths over the windows enhances the cooling effects of the breeze.

There are times, especially when the temperature is over 90, I very much appreciate air conditioning – the way it cools the air and takes away some of the humidity. But I loved open windows as a kid at night, hearing the crickets hum and smelling the breeze through the windows and screen doors. I loved waking in the night to a weather change, the thrill of the wind changing direction with the first norther of the fall.