Porch Chairs and Hurricanes Trilogy-Part 2 | Eastern North Carolina Now

I Was So Shocked I Almost Ran Off The Road...Part 1
Written May 19, 2011
Updated May 28, 2017
    I was driving along the other day and I looked to my right and there it was something I don't think I have seen in 45 years. There was a man sitting on his porch in one of his porch chairs. Don't you get it? Ok, I'll say it again but more slowly this time...

There ... was ... a ... man ... sitting ... on ... his ... porch ... in ...

one ... of ... his ... porch ... chairs.
    Stop and think about this sight. Ask yourself when the last time you saw someone sitting in a porch chair. Been quite a while has it not?

    Everyone who has a porch has porch chairs. They are everywhere. They are probably a billion dollar industry but they are not for sitting in. They are for looking at. Porch chairs are probably one of the most useless things we have in the good ole USofA.

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    Life before TV...

     People would sit outside after supper on their porch chairs and wait for the neighbors to come walking by.

     My family did not have a porch or porch chairs but we did not let that stop us. We did have concrete area in front of the plate glass window of our family grocery store and that served as our porch. For chairs, we brought out four kitchen chairs to serve as substitute porch chairs.

     This routine was usually initiated by my father saying, "Time to set up the kitchen chairs".

     As we sat, the neighbors would come walking by and make chit chat... "Nice night", "How are you doing this evening", "President Truman sure made a big mistake by sending our boys to Korea", "Dat (I was raised in New Orleans) hurricane (New Orleans is in Louisiana) will be here tomorrow this time. Don't forget to put the masking tape on your front plate glass window", etc.

     At some point in the evening it was our turn to get up from our kitchen chairs and walk around the neighborhood to chit chat to the neighbor who had returned from their walks or had yet to walk their walks.

     We left our chairs setting there without giving them a second thought that someone would steal our kitchen chairs while we were gone. There was no need to put chains around the chairs like Wal-Mart has to do with everything not nailed down outside their stores today.

    I know I have confused you, my dear readers, by using a term in this posting that you are completely unfamiliar with and for that I apologize. I will now explain myself.

    As you read above you most certainly said to yourself, "Self, what is a neighbor?" (Educating my readers is one of the greatest pleasures I get from blogging)...

Neighbors are the people who live in the houses around your house who you never see because they are inside their houses watching Dancing with the Stars content in the knowledge that their porch chairs are on their porch making them look neighborly.
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    Getting back to the beginning of this Foolishness, is it possible that that guy I saw sitting on his porch in his porch chair is not the beginning of a comeback for sitting out after supper, walking and chit chat? Or could it be that his TV was broken and he was waiting for the Best Buy delivery truck?

    That second thought about Best Buy in the paragraph above is a sobering one. I wish I had not thought it.

    On the other hand, Televisions and Unnecessary Porch Chairs just might be conclusive evidence of the progress our society has made since I was a kid...Or is it?

    Would I kid u?
    Smartfella