My grandmother lived and died in a little green and white bungalow with a wide front porch in Dennis, Mississippi. She moved around a bit in her married life, but in widowhood she returned to the house with the inviting front porch and never left it. Shaded by massive water oaks that allowed only minimal sunlight, the porch bordered a sloped yard that sported mostly just a dense green spongy moss covering, broken up occasionally by wisps of anemic grass shoots, ever hopeful but consistently disappointed. When they built the house in 1925, she and my grandfather optimistically planted those well-placed water oaks and they grew to do their job beautifully, ensuring no grass to deal with and a shady setting for afternoon naps and watching the world go by.
She did a lot of watching her world, most often in late afternoon after all else had been put in order. The front porch swing was usually reserved for visiting relatives or passersby, as her favorite perch involved a broad rocker with wide arm rests and peeling white paint. I loved the swing for those sweltering afternoons when nothing but a pillow and an ages old Grimm’s Fairy Tale book would suffice. That faded and tattered book was actually the only one in the house that was even slightly interesting for children to read, and even that notion is in serious question when you consider the theme of many of those fairy tales. Better informed than Walt Disney, I know that the real wicked stepsisters actually cut off their toes to fit in the glass slipper. I know that because I had access to Grimm’s Fairy Tales. Not light reading, I can tell you. As a scholar in the truest sense of the word, my grandfather had collected Greek, Latin, and Calculus tomes, which were the only other choices in the house—again, nothing appropriate for a young girl, so the fairy tales and well-worn swing were what often lulled me into afternoon oblivion.
We still own that house, along with a smaller ramshackle board house across the pine thicket, occupied rent-free by a guy who looks after the “big house,”, or at least dutifully reports any limbs or power lines down, and each winter trims the crepe myrtles. A local historical group recently pictured the smaller house in a photo collage of abandoned houses, and just the slightest bit offended, I informed them that the house was not actually abandoned but was definitely worthy of inclusion in the history annals of Tishomingo County. It’s not easy to maintain sites of historical interest, but we’re doing our part.
The porch swing that graces my grandmother’s front porch has been in the same place, on the same rusty chains, for well over 60 years. Its slatted seat is perfectly molded, with just the slightest dipped center on both sides, to accommodate two people sitting side by side, and at exactly the right height off the ground to ensure minimal effort to achieve a gentle glide. On top of that, there is just a tiny bit of give so that when you sit down, the swing sinks a bit but recovers nicely, as if to remind you of who is actually in charge of the seating situation. It takes a lot of years and a lot of rear ends to get a swing that perfect. You just can’t buy it at Lowe’s and that one is certainly not for sale. It’s priceless.
An old swing is the first indication that a place has been a well-used and well-loved home. Not a house, but a Home. If the swing has an age-worn seat, molded from years of use, and is adorned with flaking paint and questionable chains, you can be sure of it. That’s true of most front porch swings, at least those that grace older homes that have welcomed and sheltered families through decades of ownership. I napped on the same swing in the same place where my dad courted my mom on those Saturday afternoons so many years ago. I like to think it’s where they planned their future. it’s the same swing where Aunt Ruth enjoyed her afternoon coffee when her family visited from Texas, and it’s the vantage point from which Big Mama watched her grandkids hunt Easter eggs in the pine thicket every spring. It’s where we gathered after weddings and funerals or for family reunions in later years, and it’s where I still picture just about every good thing that happened in that house. I have a cousin who travels from Baton Rouge each year, in part just to sit on that swing and while away an afternoon. It’s that appealing.
In fact, I’d go so far as to say most old porch swings, and that one in particular, are very much like family, with an open invitation to sit and visit a while. Time is of no concern, they’re always glad to see you, and their embrace is warm and comfortable and familiar.
My dad and I returned to the little green and white bungalow today, just to check on it as we do every so often. While he waited in the car, I wrestled the back door padlock into submission and pushed open the heavy wooden door to the enclosed back porch. The cold immediately assailed me–the dank heavy motionless November cold of a house that is in quiet retirement, with no more family to support. I wandered through the unused rooms noting nothing out of place, and then I spied it. There, in the midst of all those scholarly epistles was the unmistakable tattered green cover of Grimm’s Fairy Tales, as out of place as ever but still perfectly capable of drawing my undivided attention.
Plucking the fairy tale collection from the dusty bookshelf, I determined to thumb through it later, relieved to rescue my prize from the oblivion of the corner bookshelf. Anxious to complete the walkthrough and return to the relative warmth of the waiting car, I rounded the corner past the front porch and just couldn’t help it. Like a siren song, the worn white swing beckoned out of the corner of my eye. How could I refuse? Mumbling something to my dad about the need to check the front porch, I made a trancelike beeline for the family swing, Its crusty peeling paint, warped seat slats, and customary “give” as I settled my weight were thankfully expected and unchanging. Had I been alone, I have no doubt a pillow and a fairy tale and a nap would have been involved.
And I also have no doubt that I would have been immeasurably happy. Because that’s the way it should be when you spend time with family.
