Summertime Fun on the Screened-in Porch

 The photo shows my grandparents' farmhouse of long ago. The house was sold after my grandfather stopped farming the fields and the barn, that once housed chickens and cows and horses with kids running around playing, became silent and empty. That's when my grandparents built a smaller home on land that was part of the farm, big enough to house my grandparents and one of my aunts.

But way before that farmhouse was sold I had so much fun with my cousins playing inside and outside that home. There was no TV. No internet. There were no video games. No cell phones. If there had been such things, there would have been no time to bother with them. Playing and pretending were top priority. 

It never took much to amuse us. I remember one summer it just took a few pairs of scissors, some straight pins and used magazines and we were good to go for days, playing on the screened-in porch of that farmhouse. 

I can't remember if it was an officially declared 'Club' we created. It might have been. We seemed to like 'Clubs.' The best was in our chicken coop schoolhouse. We formed "The Girls Club." There were four official members, but one was hardly ever there. She lived far away in Massena. Oddly enough one of the three remaining members was a boy. My cousin. The other member's brother. We were all close in age. He was most always playing along with us so after he promised to adhere to the rules of The Girls Club and repeat the Club's Pledge with us, he was admitted.

But our playing on the screened-in porch didn't seem to interest him. I don't know how it began but most every day for a while, my other cousin and I would sit inside that porch on the left-hand side and cut out what we considered to be interesting photos from magazines. This was during the era of many magazines sitting in homes, so we had lots of photos to choose from. The items we cut out varied from food to animals to kids to famous people and anything else we found amusing or interesting. After we'd cut something out, we'd take some straight pins and pin the photo up with the other photos pinned up underneath the screened-in windows. I can't remember the purpose of doing so or if there was a purpose. I do remember how much fun it was to sit there on summer afternoons with my cousin and laugh and talk about what or who we'd found interesting enough to cut out of a magazine and join our magnificent display of glossy pin-ups.

But such fun never lasts. 

It all came to a very sad end when a raging thunderstorm sent the rain through those screened-in windows and our glossy photos turned to mush. All that was left were the straight pins. So many straight pins all over that porch. 

But the rain didn't wash away the memories of those summer afternoons, sitting with my cousin on the screened-in porch of a most beloved farmhouse.