Rarely did I step outside my house for leisure. Either I was leaving or coming home. Didn't participate in the porch sitting rituals of my neighborhood. It was a bitter time and I didn't want to deal with the other humans. I had gained some perspective in this house. I have always managed to dare myself into taking a step out of my own comfort zone, and this house had attained its status of comfortable. I gave the porch a shot.
The porch was mostly over grown seeing as I had no gardener and never spent more than the time it takes to find a key there. I consider myself a perceptive person, the porch considered me aloof. This porch was only about 4 feet deep and 6 feet wide, rising 3 feet off the ground. Not necessarily conducive to porch sitting but I was committed by this time. Two willy-thick green bushes had grown up the front and onto the flat surface of the porch, shrinking the area by a foot on either side. A rouge tree branch , grey and dead but still somehow attached, hung in-front of the walkway and over the stairs. I dodged it every day and wondered If his brother branches, still living, were trying to save him. They didn't know it was too late. I didn't know it wasn't.
There had been a chair on the porch when I moved in. Aluminum pipes with some red and white canvas stretched over it. It was ratty and covered in web. I now dusted it off and saw the actual hue of the red beneath the layers of filth. What a nice chair. I sat.
I pulled up my book and began reading. Not a bad place to read. No ones around either. I smiled like I was getting away with something.
"do not tell them you was manin' that cannon!
That big gun sent too many boats
straight to hell.
The orders came from japan.
To spare us
but kill the men who fired
that big gun.
Don't tell em' it was you!"
- B. T Masters after Wake Island- 1945
Time moved quickly past as it tended to when reading, or writing. A school down the road had just let out. Id hear it at 3:15 PM every day. It didn't sound much different from the crows that squawked throughout the day, just louder. Like the crows had gotten excited. They would get excited, and as loud as the school children from time to time. There were events that set them a-stir. Roadkill- the crow banquet.
Being on the porch, I could now discern child from crow, and saw the hordes as they marched past. Bubbling and fat, covered in plastic, and if you're lucky enough to have seen plastic melt onto something, imagine that. They bobbled past and spoke in tongues. I could pick out a few words. Immortal words. They used more immortal words than we did at that age. Maybe one day, we would evolve into speaking a whole entire immortal language of 'FUCK's and 'SHIT's. These stinkers went by and all looked the same. I was sad they would turn into people.
I was unlucky enough to live on the corner. Within striking distance.
"Nice dead grass Asshole!" A little cheese dumpster shouted. Cool fuckin' hair kid.
"Go away." I replied loud and to the point. You cant just curse at little kids. Not if you want to keep a low profile at least.
"It looks like a shit!" King dumb dumb the cheese dumpster screamed. He made sure for me to hear. He had two Cronies- A gigantic girl with watermelon tits, she was a freakishly well endowed 8th grader, haunting image. The other was a little one. Half the size of the cheese dumpster, and no command. He was just a shit eater. I bet the fatty's he hung out with walked all over him all the time. He had little spikes in his hair and wore a huge button-up shirt with predictable fuck-off designs dancing about it. His shoes were from space. All of their shoes were from space. Cheese dumpster wore an array of brands around his body. It was as if he had been passed through a label machine. A few times. He looked like the state fair. Jugs wore something one step above a moo-moo. I was starting to get sick.
"Eat shit" I replied under my breath. There was no way they could hear me. They heard me.
"OOOOOOOOO IM TELLIN MY MAAAMAA!!!" Jugs said jumping around. I worried about the frames on my walls.
"Her moms gonna sue yer ass!!" Cheese dumpster pointed as he said this. I burried my face in my hands for a moment and wondered if any of this was worth my time. Fuck the porch.
"Go away." I stood up, folded the chair, and began toward the curb. Someone would want this chair for their porch. Why, I do no know.
"AHHH! He's gonna hit us with the chair! aaahhh!!!" The little spike haired peon screamed. He looked to either side, to the big ones, for approval. They joined in the screaming and he was fulfilled. They all ran off down the road together screaming. I left the chair and went inside. There was no place for negligent lawn keepers in todays world. There was hardly any room to sit on my porch. Fuck the porch.
This is the first time I've recalled the porch since that day. There was no room in my life for the porch.
Consider your surroundings. Watch the way they change and stay weary- This is where you live, and this is what is happening.
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