The Perfect Screened Porch

My favorite room in childhood was the large screened porch opening from the living room through folding glass doors. My father installed glass windows all around for the winter (making for beautiful Christmas tree spot), but it's the summer I remember most fondly.

On Sunday nights with the Chenoweths, the grown-ups would gather there for cocktails while the kids ran in and out to the yard and games. Later, when the lightning bugs came out, some would float through or escape from our punch-hole-lidded jars. On lazy afternoons, my cousin and I would play camp-out there on the brick floor and in the one flat grassy place just below, down the railroad tie steps. On weekends, I often practiced and performed on the stage of three steps, using the drapes across the doors as the stage curtain. More often than not, I acted with Tallulah Bankhead on her Co-Star LP. On weeknights, while we waited for Daddy to come home from work, I would wait there for him. I corralled him, taking him away from his martini, and made him play catch with me in the yard. Sometimes, I just sat on the screened porch, under the slow moving, iron ceiling fans with one of my cats, staring off into space. I sure wish I had a screened now.

My friend Boo has the perfect screened, fitted with an old chaise and assorted tables and chairs. Always accessible through an open door, the porch serves as second home for her cat and dog, who come and go, to perch and sleep as I would like to do under a canopy of green.