posted by Mike Madison at 2:36 PM /
It is gorgeous outside today, and Spring's pending arrival offers the return of a favorite warm-weather ritual: sitting on our front porch and chatting with passing neighbors.
We have friends in the neighborhood who do the same thing, because they can. They have porches. Porch-sitting is a great thing, especially in the late afternoon and early evening in the summer, when it's a little damp outside and the fading sunlight casts a warm glow over the street.
A lot of Mt. Lebanon houses have no front porches. Side porches, yes, but many side porches have been enclosed over the years and turned over to TV sets and sofas. A porch is a public space, a space for socializing with whoever happens to walk past. Even an open side porch is a more private and less neighborly space than a front porch. Patios in the backyard are the most private of all. Mt. Lebanon has lots of patios and backyard decks.
Many Mt. Lebanon residents love the town's sidewalks and take ample advantage of them. There are walkers and runners and strollers on sidewalks everywhere. We do not seem to be a town of porch-sitters, on the whole, and that gives a certain cast to just how social and sociable our neighborhoods can be . Many of the oldest Mt. Lebanon homes have porches -- the farm houses, the Craftsman bungalows, and some of the earliest of the 1920s homes. But something happened in the late 1920s and 1930s; homes from that era, and more recent homes, seem to be largely porch-free. I walk by a lot of homes on those great sidewalks, and all I see are stone and brick and doors and windows. No people.
This Spring and Summer, count the porch-sitters. And talk to them, of course.
[Via Kottke.org, which included a pointer to this social history of the porch]
We have friends in the neighborhood who do the same thing, because they can. They have porches. Porch-sitting is a great thing, especially in the late afternoon and early evening in the summer, when it's a little damp outside and the fading sunlight casts a warm glow over the street.
A lot of Mt. Lebanon houses have no front porches. Side porches, yes, but many side porches have been enclosed over the years and turned over to TV sets and sofas. A porch is a public space, a space for socializing with whoever happens to walk past. Even an open side porch is a more private and less neighborly space than a front porch. Patios in the backyard are the most private of all. Mt. Lebanon has lots of patios and backyard decks.
Many Mt. Lebanon residents love the town's sidewalks and take ample advantage of them. There are walkers and runners and strollers on sidewalks everywhere. We do not seem to be a town of porch-sitters, on the whole, and that gives a certain cast to just how social and sociable our neighborhoods can be . Many of the oldest Mt. Lebanon homes have porches -- the farm houses, the Craftsman bungalows, and some of the earliest of the 1920s homes. But something happened in the late 1920s and 1930s; homes from that era, and more recent homes, seem to be largely porch-free. I walk by a lot of homes on those great sidewalks, and all I see are stone and brick and doors and windows. No people.
This Spring and Summer, count the porch-sitters. And talk to them, of course.
[Via Kottke.org, which included a pointer to this social history of the porch]
1 Comments:
We enjoy our front porch in the summer, even though we have a deck on the back of the house as well. The people watching is half of the fun!
However,we don't enjoy watching all of the traffic speed down the street and run the stop sign on the corner.
Oh well!
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