Living without A/C

I want to take a minute to comment on a phenomenon that is very prevalent here and which, frankly, is one I do not understand. There are lots of wonderful things about living in this part of California...there is absolutely no humidity, no bugs (other than late-summer yellow jackets, apparently), super cool nights even in summer, and cool foggy mornings that are perfect for being outside.

However, virtually no houses here have central A/C. I understand, in theory, why it isn't needed. We don't have it, and I have gotten it down to a fine art how to maximize the coolness in our house. (i.e., windows cracked at night, open in the early morning, then closed and blinds drawn for most of the day until about 4pm when it starts to cool down again and I open the whole house up with all fans going max speed to cool it down.) It is rare that our house gets above 82 or 83 degrees even when it's really hot outside (we have had a few very awful miserable days, but only a few.) A nice breeze is usually moving through the house, and we spend a lot of the time with the back door and screen wide open so that Jack can go in and out.

Justin did get us a small portable A/C unit so that I can cool down Jack's room for naptime. This has been a lifesaver on those days when the temps have spiked, and we have plans for next summer to get another, bigger unit for the main part of the house. We've made compromises and most of the time it's comfortable. But I have a few questions / observations that I would like to make.

1. Why? I understand that it's comfortable here MOST of the time, and it's okay MOST of the time to exist without A/C. But why?? It's not that expensive to add it to a house (and our street, with our little rental house, is full of $1.2/$1.3 million houses that have NO A/C!!) Maybe it's cheaper to save on electric if you can never run your A/C? Better for the environment? Or maybe...

2. Have we become wimps?? I am sure people everywhere don't have A/C. I knew people in downtown Boston apartments that didn't. We looked at houses there with no A/C. Here, EVERY. SINGLE. HOUSE. we looked at had no A/C. We did have it in our (brand new) temporary apartment, and in all honesty, I didn't run it that much. I preferred to have the windows open. But I had the option, and I wonder if I am stifling myself (ha ha) because I know in the back of my head that I don't have the option to turn on the A/C. We wear less clothes now and Jack runs around in just a diaper most days, but no one really minds. Have we just become so accustomed to being able to adjust our surroundings by a few degrees here or there that I can't live without it?

3. And finally, while virtually no houses here have A/C, many public places don't either. I'd say at least 70 percent of the restaurants in the area that we have been to don't have it. Our local mall doesn't have it (they just always leave the doors open.) Target does, but they post signs all the time about how they are conserving energy and turning off the cooling, so I don't ever really feel like it's on. Is it a cultural thing? Area thing? California thing? Or a rest of the world thing that, growing up in the south, we were never exposed to? I stayed in plenty of places in Europe that didn't have A/C. My dorm at Oxford didn't. I think this is normal for everyone else, and I am struggling with the concept!

I should end this diatribe by stating that yes, we do have central heat, and that is apparently a huge necessity here in the winter...but I doubt I will feel the same. I am pretty sure I am still acclimated to very cold winters :)