I LOVE OUR BACK PORCH, OUR HOME & OUR NEIGHBORHOOD. It's been so hot all Summer long, heck, since May really and I forgot how much I enjoy getting up early and spending time out here. I'm sitting across from our two rocking chairs on my very favorite 1950's metal glider. It's rusted, it's that era-specific mint green and I'm so proud of my Mexican oil cloth custom-made and oh so comfy cushion. I love where we live.
Our neighborhood is like a Norman Rockwell painting. Today especially, on this 10 year anniversary of the terrible attack on the very essence of America, I am particularly reflective and pensive about my safe and quintessentially American neighborhood-the kind the "greatest generation" fought to preserve.
Here, kids still ride their bikes down the streets and our door bell in rung multiple times on a Saturday by neighbor kids asking if our children "can come out and play." For real. I know our neighborhood post mistress by name. All the mail here is delivered the old fashioned way- through the door or in the tiny boxes on our front porches. When I broke my leg, our post mistress even came all the way into my bedroom to give me the mail and wish me well. There is an American flag flying off at least a couple of porches in every single block. Our police officers stop and play basketball in the street with our son and his pal and show off their sirens and radios for the kids. We have parades on the fourth of July and the homecoming football game is a really big deal and keep in mind, we are in the center of a huge city.
Big city, small town.
In the mornings like today, I can hear and occasionally see the tops of people's heads who are running, walking or cycling by for their daily dose of exercise. I should take a cue, honestly...but that's another blog.
I also love that the kids here walk or ride their bikes to and from the 100 year old school just three blocks from here. I love these old houses too, they are each so distinctive and unique, not like the newer neighborhoods where every single house has the exact same exterior lights and if you look closely enough, one of only four front doors which repeat in a certain pattern. Those homogenous neighborhoods are fine, but there's just something so Americana about the old homes from the 1920's and 30's.
Friday evening as I drove through our "hood," I counted five neighbors out in their front yards hand-watering. We are in the midst of a terrible drought here in Texas, so aside from the one day a week we are allowed to use sprinklers, we are allowed to "hand water" anytime. What I noticed about my neighbors who were taking full advantage of the evening cool down and their opportunity to quench their scorched grass was that they were ALL holding their garden hose in one hand and their glass of wine in the other. How seriously cool is that. I live in a neighborhood where it is the norm to sip wine and water your grass at the same time. In the distance I had to drive, I counted five neighbors in their Friday "wine-down water time" and it made me smile.
Was Norman Rockwell a wine drinker?
