If it hadn't been a blue frost night on January 31, 1941, I may have been born on the front porch of that little faux brick, tarpaper-wrapped shack that sat smack-dab beside and facing the railroad tracks in the Rose Hill area of Flomaton, Alabama. On the wrong side of the tracks. Mama chewed her knuckles, clawed the sheets and sweat buckets while Dr. Sally used forceps to deliver my sweet little noggin. Three older siblings lay in beds in the back room having competitions with the dreaded whooping cough. Dr. Sally told Mama that I would be just fine as I had immunity for life. Mama didn't relax; she pushed and screamed. I plopped out to face a world of troubles caused by Adolph Hitler. The trains rolled, hobos rode the rails. Mama opened to knocks on our back door with plates of eggs, gravy and biscuits. I thrived, the trains rolled. The weather warmed and we front porch sat.
My earliest memory of front porch sitting was around the age of three. We lived on 3rd Avenue in Atmore. Daddy had taken a job at the shipyard in Mobile to do his part in the war effort. Mama kept vigil with her ration book and counted her tokens. Halloween came to our front porch. I remember having a glimpse of kids running up and down the sidewalk; back and forth across the street wearing white sheets from off their mama's beds. My brothers were given free range permits while my sister and I sat on the porch with Mama watching the fun. We ate gingerbread and popcorn balls.
TIME HOP!
Our home at Barnett Crossroads was built at the end of WWII. Daddy had helped to defeat Hitler. The war was done with, the country was recovering and life was changing. Our new house had a big old front porch. We couldn't see our nearest neighbor, but we could hear them. In fact, we could hear things like cars and trucks coming from way up or down the gravel road. We knew exactly who owned which by the sounds of the engines. Any unknown sound was an outsider; we gathered on the porch to see.
Clyde Hawkins' new Buick could be heard way above Albert Bell's place. It had that one-of-a-kind low, smooth rumble. Rocks splayed out from under fender skirts. We got off the road and out of the deep ditch between it and our lane to sit and watch as Clyde came flashing by. Daddy worried about speed for Clyde and reduction in numbers of his young'uns if things went wrong. We sat on the edge of the front porch until we got the all clear.
We were free range kids and our parents loved that. Our neighbors, Mr. George Godwin and Mr. Charlie Dawson owned livestock that roamed the woods until stock laws were passed to put them under fencing. Mr. George (aka "Blue Head," due to age and hair color) owned a big herd of goats and a Billy as big as a truck. That old Billy could be heard bleating and we headed for the porch until he led his girls on through. Mr. Charlie owned a burly old steer that must have always been in pursuit of love. He could be heard bellowing and snorting out there somewhere in the hardwood thickets and stands of longleaf yellow pine. We knew for certain that he needed to be respected. We sat porch side.
We spent spring/summer/early fall evenings on the porch. Daddy in the swing enjoying a dip of Tops; or his terminal affair with Prince Albert. Mama sat in a rocker, the latest crawler held by the coattail to stop a fall from the high end of the porch. Some of us would jump off that high end, while others would roll about in the yard catching lighting bugs or lay flat-backed to ponder the stars (or in my case, to question how far the world went). An older sibling told me if I went far enough, I could look over the edge like at the crust of the old red gully.
Pea picking season brought porch time for shelling and swinging. We watched as the world passed by. Few outsiders passed in those days. If one did it caused dead aim attention from us. My brother Jarvis, (aka "Humpy") could turn anything into something interesting and fun. One day we were on the front porch waiting for life to come take us away when we became aware of the sound of an unknown vehicle coming from the south. We all sat like a million-dollar bird dog that had a blue-ribbon point. Finally!
A shiny black car pulled to a stop in the middle of the road. A snappy-dressed guy got out to walk to our picket gate and ask for directions to the Barnett Crossroads. Humpy, needing a change of pace told him to turn around and go back to Charlie Dawson's mailbox "just right there." Follow it all the way around until he came to the pavement, take a left and it would take him right to the Barnett Crossroads. We sat on that front porch to wait and see. In about ten minutes the snappy-dressed stranger came roaring by, looking straight ahead while we rolled on those old heart pine planks of our porch laughing like fools.
Mama and Daddy didn't hear about that for years.
Our front porch was for cooling, visiting, shelling, whippings, rocking babies, ice cream making, watermelon cutting, fighting, combing out Grandma Smiths plaits, listening to the Grand Old Opry and best of all, COURTING. Grandma Smith called our porch the piazza. She pronounced it "pizzer."
***Today I live in a new home with a wrap-around porch.***
Earline’s first book “Life With the Top Down” is now available for sale in paperback at: http://www.lulu.com/shop/earline-crews/life-with-the-top-down/paperback/product-24146318.html and also available in e-book format at Lulu.com, Barnes & Noble.com, Amazon.com, Kobo.com, and on the Apple iBookstore.
