The Real Reason I have a Porch

Or, What the government used to harm me. God used it for my good. (A loose paraphrase of Gen 50:20)

But before I tell you the story about why I built my porch, a prequel of sorts.

Before the age of Facebook, our family had a program called something like “My family”?  It was a good way to communicate what was going on in your life and to share ideas. Sort of like an early social media site. 

And, before the age of “my family”, my uncle Hube occasionally published his thoughts about life. He did it by email, he had a list of several dozen email addresses with his friends and family, and he would occasionally send an essay about his life, one of those email addresses was mine. I really enjoyed reading them. His writing really encouraged my writing. 

While I was working on this post, I thought about something I wrote 20 years ago about my uncle Hube and also about my porch.

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What would Hubert do? 

Karl Hostetler 6-14-2009

I have an uncle Hube who writes wonderful essays. They have a kind of Garrison Keillor feel to them that brings to mind the simple timeless truths that lie at the core of what is good about the “good old days”. When they on occasion show up in my inbox it is a welcome respite from the actual cacophony of motion and madness that more resembles the reality of my life. So there is within me a longing to be, well, more like my uncle Hubert. Except of course for the really old part. Now while I don’t actually have a WWHD bracelet or anything, the call of a more peaceful, pastoral,  “hubertesque” life is something I often ponder. It was with this in mind that I decided, in the course of remodeling my home, to add a front porch.  After all, I could picture my uncle Hube sitting on his front porch and watching the world go by. You can imagine my anticipation when finally the porch was, while not finished, at least far enough along to use. I pulled an old bench from around the side of the house, set it on the porch, and plopped down. Hmm. You may find this hard to believe, but I have a fairly good view of my front lawn from my porch. A saying relating the excitement of a given activity with the watching of grass grow briefly flits through my mind, but I banish it. Right beyond my slowly growing lawn is the street on which I live. There are lots of cars that park on my street and one is forced to assume that they are driven up and down the street on occasion. It would seem, too, that people would from time to time walk down the sidewalk that lay between the street and my yard, but on this particular occasion no one drove by and no one walked by. I did notice that my lawn needed mowing. A bit disappointed by the lack of porch front activity I decided that the minute or so I had spent sitting on my porch bench was probably about enough for the day, or even the week for that matter. You know, I thought to myself as I got up to do something more useful, I bet Hubert doesn’t even have a front porch. No, Hubert is probably much more likely to be found with a good book in front of a roaring fire. Yes hearth and home. My house doesn’t actually have a fireplace, but I had been contemplating putting one in as part of the aforementioned remodeling project. An honest assessment of the porch experience seemed to suggest that it in itself was not going to simplify and enrich my life to the degree I had hoped, what I needed was a fireplace, just like my uncle Hubert. Yeah, I can put it right in the corner of my new game room. But this time I’m hedging my bet. Right above that fireplace, I’m going to make a niche, a big niche, just the right size for a widescreen plasma TV. Because most things in life, even the simple things, look a heck of a lot better in high def.

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Okay, I realize I fibbed when I said, I decided to add a porch. Here is the real story about how my porch came to be.  

Doesn’t matter if it is intentional, harm is harm. It cost me something, it cost me 100 hours of design work. It cost me several hundred dollars in fees. And it caused me to contact a lawyer. (He said I have a case, but it isn’t worth proceeding.) I guess I’ve experienced it numerous times when I’ve dealt with the city governments while pulling permits for my clients. The government always wants something, sometimes it is your property. And unfortunately everyone just acquiesces, they say okay because they need their approval.  You have been held hostage. So, you just give away what you’ve worked hard to purchase to get a permit to work on your house. It is maddening, when I see it in my customers’ projects, it is maddening when I see it in my own property. 

In my case, the city decided to change the setbacks in my neighborhood. They just didn’t tell anyone about it. When I tried to pull a permit to add a game room over my garage I was told I can’t do that. What do you mean? It was basically the same addition that was done 3 times in my block. And dozens of times in the neighborhood. But for me, no can do. So what did I do, I acquiesced. End of story. Actually, the beginning of the story.  

If you know me pre stroke, you knew I hated the regulatory bureaucracy that has ruined California. Post stroke, I still hate it, but I guess I have different problems and different priorities. Back in the day this would have been a good intro to a July fourth post about our eroding freedom. Instead it is an intro into what God did for my good.

What the government did to harm me, God used it for good.

One thing I’ve realized, how you respond to bad things is maybe more important than what actually happened. Twenty years ago, when this happened, I responded with anger, it caused me to sleep fitfully for a while. Yeah, I stewed for a while. But after maybe a year I started designing a new place for a game room.

I changed gears and built a new garage at the other side of my house, and I remodeled the existing garage into a gameroom. But with one problem. There was no way to connect the new garage to the house without going through a bedroom. It is a no no is my book. Additions shouldn’t look like they’ve been added. So I designed a porch between the garage and the front door. It looks fine and it connects the garage to the house but in my mind it was 300 sq. ft. of useless space. Or so I thought.  

Due to my stroke, my porch has become the best part of my house. I sit there every morning, it grounds my day. There I think good thoughts, I read my Bible, I pray, I just soak in the new morning. Back in the day, I would spend 3 seconds on my porch as I rushed into my day. Now I stop and sit for a while. One of the good things about having a stroke is it causes you to stop, to sit, to meditate, to think. One of the good things about having a porch is you can do all of that. Without my porch, I would be living inside with my TV going while my life is passing me by. 

Watching the simple things, even in High-Def, doesn’t hold a candle to living your life in real time. Would I trade experiencing the simple things I can see on my porch for a high octane, high def, special effects story about saving the world from zombies? Hmm, sometimes I will do that. But if I had to choose one or the other. My porch wins every time. Experiencing the good, like smelling the roses, requires us to slow down. Slow down and sit for a while. And while I’m there, rarely, but sometimes, I will write a poem. 

ON MY PORCH

Opening up to the world,
With my house at my back with a roof over top.
It is an in-between place,
Between my life (which lives in my house) and the world around me.
Both secure and exposed.
While I’m there, I am grounded in the good, steeling for the day.
The beauty around is peeking on, beckoning me,
Get off your chair,
Come and play.
Deep breaths, and off we go!
What a beautiful way to meet a new day.

I’m so thankful to God for my porch. And Ontario, what you wanted to do, take some of my property, actually caused me to have a porch. What the government did to harm me, God used it for good.