A faint coat of pollen blanketed the top of my grandmother’s front porch throughout my childhood. The pollen on the porch was a constant source of aggravation for my grandmother, who apparently declared war on the pollutant long before any of us were born. Everyone gravitated to the front porch at grandmother’s house, which was my families stomping ground for several generations; our place to touch base with each other and visit my grandmother, especially on holidays. My grandmother complained of pollen every time we visited, forever using the occasion to draft her family in her war against the contamination of her front porch. However, her complaining did result in our desire to please her, so she managed to recruit many loyal elves in the process. Moreover, it encouraged her grandchildren to happily run around slinging a soapy front porch mop, in an effort to become proficient mopers. Since my grandparents bought the house when my mother was ten, the front porch endured three generations of temper tantrums, holiday fights, and beatings by whatever new toy appeared on the market every Christmas. I wonder how many toy trucks made their way from one side of the porch to the other. My siblings and I spent a good deal of time on the front porch, or in the yard playing, until we were old enough to graduate to the house. With the exception of a holiday, bad weather, or illness we were not in the house much, a practice I understood with more clarity when I became a grown-up. Of course, we went in the house to eat, and in the evening, but the rest of our time was spent playing outdoors. Playing inside was a privilege for many reasons, but I loved listening to the sound of the screen door as everyone crossed the threshold. If you were inside the house, the sound of the door defined what was going on outside, by the way it swung on the hinges. For example, if the door closed abruptly, you could hear the screen bounce off the door frame a few times before it slowly swung to a close. Happiness on the other hand, was marked by silence, since it meant the door was open, while someone stood in the threshold socializing with whoever sat on the porch. In addition, I spent much of my young life listening to the sound of a voice shouting, “Close the screen door!” and much of my adult life will be spend enjoying the memory. It will join the phrase, “You are letting in mosquitoes! Alternatively, another favorite expression, “You’re letting the air out the door” letting the air out? I know, I know, I know what it means when referring to a front door, but a porch screen door? The air on the porch is the same air, is it not? Anyway, the best example of my screen door theory took place one Christmas holiday, after Christmas dinner: One Christmas my grandmother invited a close friend as a guest for Christmas dinner. This visitor was a quest the previous year, and was kind enough to bring her awful tasting plum pudding for dessert. And though the sentiment was appreciated the pudding tasted so awful we took turns excusing ourselves from the table- that way we could race each other to the bathroom, so we could spit out the ingredients in the sink. This is not an exaggeration, we were literally stepping over each other to get in the bathroom, the only exception was my mother who retreated to the restroom upstairs. Well, that was the first Christmas, my example is about the following Christmas when my grandmother’s friend volunteered her fabulous plum pudding again! And this year, my grandmother insisted, we would not repeat the same rude behavior from her table again on Christmas Eve. Consequently, I spent precious library hours searching for the appropriate etiquette one should display when eating distasteful food, or food one cannot stand from the dinner table! It is now comical that my grandmother actually expected us to eat something we found so awful. Moreover, did her friend not realize that the pudding tasted terrible, or did she enjoy torturing small children and others at Christmastime? I will for the life of me, never understand why she brought this plum pudding a second time, I guess it will always be another pudding in the sky mystery! Anyway, I knew this guest was angry when she arrived that Christmas, because the front porch door snapped back quickly when she marched through it, her hands full of plum pudding. I was young, so the most I remember is the giggling and the quick trips to the bathroom, with the exception of the look on my grandmother’s face, when she herself took a bite of her friend’s dessert. Toward the close of the evening, our guest left in a polite manner, graciously thanking my grandmother, and telling us Merry Christmas. However, her true feelings about the evening were expressed by way of the screen porch door. My grandmother’s guest took what was left of her pudding, politely smiled, and said, “ Ya’ll do have a Merry Christmas” whereupon she closed the door so abruptly you could hear the screen slam against the door frame more than a few times before the door swung wildly to a close!
The moral of this story? If you have a screen on your front porch door, you will know the true feelings of your guests. But, if you don’t have a porch door, it’s harder to tell, however, I suppose any front door can possess these qualities, so pay close attention to yours… Of course, that is with the exception of those who slam the door abruptly to a close- that would suggest you have an angry guest on your hands. In addition, watch the faces of those eating your Christmas desserts, if they run quickly to the bathroom, you should probably choose a different recipe the following year. 🙂 Merry Christmas everybody!
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