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If I could have one hour of summer right now, to spend how I want, I would choose to sit on my front porch with a few people I love, and enjoy a beer.

I really miss our porch during the winter months. I'm starting to ache a bit, just thinking about it.

Having a house with a front porch has been a top priority of mine for years. One of the first essays I wrote—for myself, not for school—was about porches. This was more than 10 years ago, before I had children, when I spent many evenings walking my old neighborhood in St. Louis.

The porch essay has in-depth theories about how front porches improve our lives and our communities. I talk about architectural styles and the importance of knowing your neighbors, and I reference how inventions like television and air conditioning changed the flavor of neighborhoods. I spout grand ideas about how ordinances should be passed requiring new houses to have front porches. Half joking, I even go as far as to suggest that people should be <em>required</em> to spend a certain amount of time of their porches.

As a piece of writing, it's overly romantic, much like my approach to life was then. But I can still get worked up about front porches.

Watching the world pass by is what I love most. From the front porch, you don't miss anything, and in our neighborhood, there's plenty to <em>not</em> be missed. It must have something to do with living in a university town, where people have really irregular schedules and are always half-delirious from sleep deprivation.

Even in the dead of winter, I see some of the strangest sights. The other night, Jason pointed out that a man was bouncing down the snowy sidewalk—in the dark mind you—on some sort of spring-loaded stilts.

But summer is peak entertainment season, of course. Thinking about how much I miss porch-sitting, and how much I love our crazy neighborhood, I was inspired to go through my collection of Tweets to create a warm-weather sketch. Here's what I found.
<h4>A neighborhood sketch, in Tweets</h4>
<span class="entry-content"><strong>June 16, 9:22 AM:</strong> <em>Starting my work day. I can hear my elderly neighbor playing her flute, competing with the birds.</em></span>

<span class="entry-content"><strong>June 19, 11:11 AM:</strong> <em>took a walk. my hood &amp; its people are achingly beautiful: toddler &amp; mom making very slow progress down sidewalk; elderly man tending garden.</em></span>

<span class="entry-content"><strong>June 25, 9:37 AM:</strong> <em>neighborhood scene: guy riding bike down brick street while drinking coffee from a regular ceramic mug.</em></span>

<span class="entry-content"><strong>June 25, 9:44 AM:</strong> <em>just got to cafe. guy on bike is here, getting a refill. I got a closer look at his mug. it says "damn, I'm good."</em></span>

<span class="entry-content"><strong>July 13, 9:34 AM:</strong> <em>on walk: heard a man making his baby giggle, smelled bacon &amp; pancakes, saw an elderly asian woman adjusting the small US flags in her garden.</em></span>

<span class="entry-content"><strong>July 17, 6:37 PM:</strong> <em>neighborhood scene: elderly couple taking evening walk, wearing jaunty straw hats and holding hands.</em></span>

<span class="entry-content"><strong>August 1, 1:34 PM:</strong> <em>just saw a guy on a bike pulling a double-decker trailer contraption with 8 other bikes on it. I kid you not.</em></span>

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<span class="entry-content"><strong>August 17, 8:28 PM:</strong> <em>just chatted w my neighbor on her porch while our kids played kickball. felt like summer evenings of my childhood, but now I'm the mom.</em></span>

<span class="entry-content"><strong>August 20, 6:36 PM:</strong> <em>porch sitting w J &amp; wine. just saw an academic-looking older couple walk by, the woman wearing oven mitts &amp; carrying some sort of cobbler.</em></span>

<span class="entry-content"><strong>September 5, 5:45 PM:</strong> <em>took a walk. saw: a man walking 3 dogs &amp; smoking a pipe; fall squash ripening in gardens; a mom &amp; toddler walking to meet dad @ bus stop.</em></span>

<span class="entry-content"><strong>September 16, 1:43 PM:</strong> <em>man across the street is taking his cat for a walk. on a leash. he does it all the time, and each time I find it humorous &amp; sort of sweet.</em></span>

<span class="entry-content"><strong>September 22, 7:23 PM:</strong> <em>dusk is settling. the girls are outside w neighbors, puppies, clarinets, soccer balls and lots of energy.</em></span>

<span class="entry-content"><strong>September 27, 3:31 PM:</strong> <em>we just saw a guy walking down the sidewalk in our neighborhood wearing just a terry robe, w a towel over his shoulder &amp; a toiletry bag!?!?</em></span>

<span class="entry-content"><strong>September 30, 12:31 PM:</strong> <em>someone just walked by the house w an iPod, singing at the top of her lungs.</em></span>

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<span class="entry-content"><strong>October 10, 2:24 PM:</strong> <em>sounds &amp; smell of a chain saw across the street take me to my grandparents' cottage in NE Mich &amp; the fall chore of stocking the wood pile.</em></span>

<span class="entry-content"><strong>October 19, 10:35 PM:</strong> <em>we were having so much fun porch sitting &amp; talking after dinner w friends, that we didn't get the kids home to bed until 9:30. bad parents.</em></span>

<span class="entry-content"><strong>October 21, 5:42 PM:</strong> <em>is leaf raking simply quaint by nature? everyone who passes by is smiling extra brightly at me. (or maybe it's the leaves stuck in my hair?)</em></span>

<span class="entry-content"><strong>October 30, 5:58 PM:</strong> <em>glad I went for the post-work walk rather than sofa-flop. gorgeous fall eve. saw several pumpkins being carved &amp; made friends w a few cats.</em></span>
<h4>What do you see happening around you, when you slow down to a porch's pace?</h4>
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