If the hero div is always the same number can't you just use the nth-child selector, in the same way you do for the table row? Failing that a short example of the HTML would help provide a solution.

Here is my final code that works. If anyone has a better way to do it, please share.

my $dom = Mojo::DOM->new($source);

my $sidecarsource = $dom->find('div.today_nowcard-sidecar')->first(qr/
+Right Now/)->content;
#print Data::Dumper::Dumper($sidecarsource);

my $sidecardom = Mojo::DOM->new($sidecarsource);

my $wind = $sidecardom->at('table > tbody > tr:nth-child(1) > td > spa
+n')->text;
[download]

You might find this cleaner:

#!/usr/bin/perl

use strict;
use warnings;

use feature 'say';
use Mojo::UserAgent;

my $url = 'https://weather.com/weather/today/l/20001:4:US';
my $selector = 'div.today_nowcard-sidecar.component.panel table tr td 
+span';
my $ua = Mojo::UserAgent->new;

say $ua->get( $url )->res->dom->at( $selector )->all_text;
[download]

However, you may want to check if their recommended API, if it offers what you want it'll be faster to access and your code more resilient to changes.

the HTML i'm working with can be found here: https://weather.com/weather/today/l/20001:4:US

the full/unedited selector is:

#APP > div > div.today.section-local-suite.page > div.section-page-nam
+e > div.hero.hero-background.layout-centered > div.hero-flex.styles-d
+2KKDEYo__heroFlex__3UOm0 > div.region.region-hero-left > div > sectio
+n > div.today_nowcard-sidecar.component.panel > table > tbody > tr:nt
+h-child(1) > td > span
[download]

(the wind speed text)

I'm thinking if i could figure out how to do a div find that would be easiest -- i have my @headers = $dom->find('div ~ today_nowcard-sidecar')->map('text')->each; but it doesn't seem to find anything...