Old School: a Visit

By Carol McEwen,

Remember when “a visit” didn’t mean a trip? It meant connecting with other people, also known these days as chatting or conversing or my least favorite: “reaching out.” Visiting didn’t happen by email, text, Zoom or Snapchat. It meant you actually sat down with someone face-to-face and TALKED. A novel concept these days.

In this context, visit could be a verb or a noun, depending on its use. Sometimes it was a noun, as in, “We had such a good visit on Sunday afternoon!” Other times it was used as a verb: “Why don’t you sit and visit awhile?”  

So where did this visiting happen? Now that warmer weather is here, I remember it was especially popular on front porches. In those days we had no air conditioning, so to find a cool breeze of an evening, or on a blazing hot afternoon, we hit those porches. Ours was equipped with a glider, but others had swings or rocking chairs. When walkers saw neighbors sitting on their porches, they’d stop in to visit. Usually my mom would treat them to a cool glass of sweet tea or a bottle of cold Pepsi.  

In this photo, my pal Susie and I are enjoying our porch and the glider, but not “visiting” much. The photo’s back says it was taken in June, 1949, which means I was four and Susie was three. I can’t imagine how much reading we were doing at that age, but there we sit, the future English teacher and the future librarian. Better yet, we had a stack of books waiting, once we finished the ones we were “reading.” 

What did the grown-ups talk about on those porches since politics and religion were considered impolite topics? In a town of 20,000, there was little news. Sometimes they talked about the weather: “Think it’ll rain tomorrow? We could sure use it. Maybe it would cool things off.” Or, they talked about a recent TV show. “Did you see I Love Lucy last night? I thought I’d die laughing when she was eating all those chocolates at the factory.”

I hate to admit it, but they gossiped, too. In fact, that was often the main topic. “Did you know the Smith’s got a new Chevy? Sure is pretty. I wonder how much that thing cost — probably at LEAST $3000.” Recipes changed hands faster than money. “I loved that cake you brought to the meeting last week. Can I have the recipe?” A garden generated lots of talk, too. “How are your tomatoes this year? Mine have tomato worms. What should I do about that?” 

If they were lucky, they had a storyteller family member or visitor. Ours was my brother-in-law, Joe, and later, his son, Mike. Their stories, told with a twinkling eye and a sly grin, were never mean, but always funny.  

Some people blame the internet for the loss of visiting in this country, but I blame air conditioning. Once people sat “buttoned up” in their houses, those Old School front porch visits were long gone.  

Carol McEwen is a writer for Stroll By The Bay, Mirimar Beach, Florida, and authored the weekly Old School column for the Arlington Sun Gazette/Gazette Leader. She may be reached at: carolwrites4fun@gmail.com.