I found myself in the driest and windiest place last week. Amarillo. I looked up the driest and windiest place in the world and most sites claim Antarctica as the driest, windiest and coldest place on Earth. Take cold out of the descriptin and there is not an overwhelming winner. Therefore, I am declaring Amarillo as the hottest, driest and windiest place that people inhabit on Earth.
I lived in Amarillo for three years during graduate school and I remember hating the wind. But not as much as I hated it this past week. I’m no longer used to a breeze. As I ventured outside everyday, I was beside myself by the dust storms and skin cracking climate.
What’s amazing is the people of Amarillo hardly seem to notice. They hate the wind and lack of rain as well, but they go on with their daily lives. The pilot of the plane thought nothing of landing our very small aircraft with no visibility in the dust storm.
I, however, needed some modifications to my outerwear to survive.
I slept with a humidifier at night but even that maybe brought up the humidity to a whopping 5%. I had to find some way to carry a humidifier around with me all day. So was born the wet handkerchief. In the driest and windiest place on Earth, the soaking wet handkerchief dries out in less than an hour. You must continually get it wet but man was it a life saver!
For the most part I tried not to let the wind stop me. But I mostly took advantage of opportunities when the sky wasn’t brown from dirt. Managed to get one horseback ride in around the block with my dad on bike:
Also found two Texas horned lizards. It wasn’t hard to find them as they were attempting a scary run across the desert of a lawn to the bird bath to get a sip of water. We since added some lizard watering bowls to the garden. Now they can find water without risking their life from birds or the much more threatening, dog. 
The horses and I didn’t get much riding in but made it up in massages and horsing around. They are dreaming of fields full of tall green grass.
As I arrived back in Dallas I was met with torrential downpours and a chance of flooding. I’m happy to breathe humid air again but my heart goes out to Amarillo. Let’s send them any chance of rain we can. And then a little more, because the people and the animals there desperately need it.
Rain.