A Virtual Porch

I love our house, even though we have too much stuff in it and not enough room (which is a stuff problem rather than a house problem), but there is one thing I wish we had been able to change when we did the big renovation back in 1998.  I wish we had been able to add a real front porch.  We went from a tiny one to a somewhat less tiny one, but it's not a real front porch with a ceiling fan and wicker chairs.  We do have nice front steps that face the street, and sometimes Tom sits there in the evening and practices his guitar, and I've occasionally sat out there with a friend and a bottle of wine for the evening.

Even without sidewalks we have lots of pedestrians on our street.  There are people walking dogs, pushing strollers, talking with friends.  Some of them are neighbors that we know, some of them we don't, but if we're outside we say hello.  If they know us or if we ask about their dog they might stop and talk for a couple of minutes.  When we're on the porch, people walking in the street might or might not take notice of us, but if we call out a greeting, it increases the odds.

A few weeks ago I was at Target and they had the outdoor chairs on sale.  I bought 4 heavy-duty metal folding chairs with the thought we could use them outside and keep them on the porch.  Our first chance was the 4th of July.  Tom cooked ribs and we ate inside, with Kathy and Steve and Mark and Fred and Max, but then moved to the front yard for ice cream.  It turned out the chairs weren't so stable on the lawn (they don't well on surfaces that aren't firm and even) but no one broke anything or even spilled their ice cream, so it was fine.

Later the guitars came out and we ended the evening with fireworks at the end of the driveway.  It was a fine way to celebrate the 4th of July.

We tried again last weekend, when we invited some of our new neighbors over for ice cream and ended up sitting outside until long after dark.  Even though the weather had been terribly hot during the day, it wasn't so bad in the evening, and there were fireflies.  Iain disappeared with the boys next door for battles with foam swords and sliding down their front lawn on a cardboard sled until it was really late and time to go to bed.  It was very pleasant.  We invited a few passersby to join us for ice cream; no one did, but a few people did walk up the driveway to say hello.

Cars and changes in design meant that our house -- built around 1950 -- didn't have a real front porch.  (As Akiko Busch wrote, "The layout of the suburbs was built to be driven through, not walked in.")  Older houses like the houses that make up most of our neighborhood (but not our street) do have them, but I don't see people actually using their porches very often.  And of course it's the usage, not the structure, that matters.  I've decided that if we don't have a front porch, we can use the space just in front of our house like it's a front porch.  No zoning variance needed.  But if you end up sitting in one of those folding metal chairs, be careful.