Overcast summers are alright, actually

In the scorching hot summer of 2022 I distinctly remember going to a local common and seeing bits of it were literally on fire due to the extreme heat. A couple of weeks later, when the rain finally came and flash flooding briefly consumed bits of north London, it remained so hot where I live in the southeast that the rain never actually hit the ground: we could see it fall and then evaporate in mid-air.

The world is heating up. London is heating up, or it was – the summer of 2022 vaulted past previous heat records by a horrifying amount, with a top temperature of 40.3C. It sucked and it will almost certainly happen again at some point. You and I both stand a fair chance of dying an extreme heat-based death in some lonely future decade.

On the positive side, this year’s been great, hasn’t it? Okay, it’s admittedly debatable as to whether it’s even summer yet, or if summer is over already. (Equinox heads will know what I’m talking about: basically there was one week in May and an odd day last month when the temperature even cracked 25 degrees.) Since then, we’ve been experiencing a truly remarkable run of overcast, sub-20 degree weather. My thermostat briefly came on last night. In July!

An overcast London summer in London should be viewed as a privilege

I do understand that this somewhat curtails the traditions of the summer: picnic in the parks, booze on the rooftops, Paul Mescal taking a topless run in his little shorts through Hackney. But I’ve found it all intensely soothing. I have absolutely no problem with a cheeky 28C (27C is better, of course), but it’s what it portends that brings me out in hives: a scorching inferno of a summer, an incinerating ‘I told you so’ reminder of how much we screwed the planet up. 

And at the risk of being all ‘who remembers binmen?’, this used to be a temperate country – I remember it raining for what felt like weeks during my childhood (admittedly probably because my parents insisted on holidaying in places like Northumberland). In an age of cheap air travel and catastrophic global heating, you truly do not have to make much effort to track down some sun on holiday. An overcast London summer should be viewed as a privilege, a story to share with our children one day – not a burden, us ducking the spectre of our scorched future for another year. 

There is something truly delightful about Taylor Swift having to crack open the gloves for the first time on her Eras tour because our weather is colder than any she has encountered in a globe trotting jaunt that began in March last year. This is what this country is all about, what we as a nation do well: not melting in brick buildings and attempting to find consolation in a £15 cocktail on a car park roof. We are rightly proud that London is a melting pot of cultures from around the world: not one of these people has come here for the warm weather.

Look, I would like a degree or two extra. A warm summer with an official promise from the Met Office that it wouldn’t go above 30 would be fine. But we live in one of the world’s great cities, there truly is a lot of stuff to do here – a lot of stuff which is a lot less enjoyable when you’re in a building without air con and panting for your life on the Victoria line. And if you’re sad that this summer hasn’t been scorchingly hot (so far) then trust me, there’ll be a warmer one along before you know it.

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