Spring’s got to be the best season.  Except for maybe fall, what with Texas football and all.  Summer is pretty good, but the damn heat can be stifling.  But spring is pretty special.  Everything turning green, the crisp air in the morning.  The smell of barbecue grills getting cranked up for the first time since early November last year.  A sense of optimism that just doesn’t exist in January in Fort Stockton.

I s’pose that’s what brought out a pretty good crowd to the Grounds for Divorce this morning.  A need to socialize with someone other than their better half and have Lucinda pour a cup of hot Folgers into the Captain My Captain mugs the cafe has started using exclusively.

Of course, even the GFD doesn’t provide a total insulation from the world around us.  Rusty came in with the morning edition of the Stockton Telegram-Dispatch and opened it up.  Started reading an article about FOX News settling with Old Dominion rather than go to court.  “They knew they’d get their clocks cleaned, the slimy bastards,” Chad piped in.

You could almost hear the hair raise on the back of Rusty’s neck.  “Don’t you need to get back to the Piggly Wiggly?  There might be a load of sardines that need to hit the shelves before they expire.”  

Lucinda cleared her throat loudly as she refilled everyone’s cup.  “You know the rules, boys.  Don’t start with that crap.”  Rusty was humbled and folded the paper back up.  Chad muttered something about sardines not ever expiring.  Pastor Peterson pulled up the listing for this 1949 Buick Roadster on his iPad.  Just the thing to defuse the situation, like nothing but a post-war Buick can.  “Now that’s more like it,” Lucinda proclaimed.  “She’s a beauty!”

“The Teal Green sets off those curvaceous lines,” Pastor Peterson said.  Kind of a risqué observation for a Methodist minister, I thought.  “The world didn’t start going to hell in a hand-basket because of political parties or cable news,” he said confidently.  “The world started down a slippery slope towards total chaos because of air conditioning.”  Even Lucinda, taking an order over at the corner booth, slid the yellow #2 pencil behind her ear and wandered back over to our table.  I swear she hears everything.

It was obvious the good pastor had command of the floor with his observation and the rest of us waited for the follow up to his bold claim.

“Just think about the house this car pulled up to when the family who bought it originally brought it home the first time,” he said.  “What do you think it looked like?”

“Probably like that neighborhood of old bungalows over south of the post office,” Rusty said.

“Exactly,” Pastor Peterson went on.  “What’s a typical house in that neighborhood look like?  Not now, maybe, but in 1949 when this Buick was brand new?”

“A lot smaller than the McMansion I just bought out in Morningwood, that’s for sure.  What are those houses, nine-hundred square feet?  Maybe a thousand?”

“Yep,” the pastor replied.  “What else?”

“Only one bathroom,” Rusty said.  “Don’t know how a family of five ever made that work.  Especially after Mexican Buffet Night over a the K-Bob’s.”

“True enough.  What else?” asked the pastor.

“If you were lucky, maybe a one car detached garage in the back yard,” some guy at the table next to us said, taking everyone kind of by surprise.

“Also true,” Peterson admitted.

“Getting back to your original point, none of those houses had air conditioning,” Lucinda proclaimed, the first to seize upon the actual point he was trying to make.  Women are so much more perceptive than men.

“And what ramifications did lack of air conditioning have, do you suppose?” he asked.

“For one thing,” Chad proudly pointed out, “the windows would be open all the time nine months of the year.”

“Even with the windows open, folks would all be out on their front porch every evening trying to stay cool,” Rusty added.

“That’s the other thing all those houses have in common.  A front porch.  A  REAL front porch, not just a stoop.  One big enough to hold some white wicker furniture, or metal lawn chairs,” Lucinda said.

Pastor Peterson was weaving his point through a series of questions and observations like Socrates 2,000 years earlier.  “Exactly.  So what would’ve happened when the family that bought this Buick brand new drove it home for the very first time?”

The guy at the next table actually slid his chair over.  Brought his coffee cup with him.  “All the other families on the block would have seen the shiny new Roadmaster pull into the driveway and headed over for a look,” he said.  “Everyone wanted to size up what the neighbors were driving, and enjoy one of life’s pivotal moments with them.  Have a look under the hood.  Smell that new interior.”  And just like that, the group had a new member.

“My point exactly,” Peterson admitted.  “There was community.  People knew what was going on in the world right around them because they were out on the front porch observing it first hand, not locked indoors staring at a screen.  Didn’t matter if it was new cars, new neighbors, kids getting hurt playing stickball in the street, or whatever.  They knew who was coming and going.  When and usually why.”

“Not always a good thing,” Lucinda said.

“Has it’s downsides,” Pastor replied.  “Virtue loves an audience.  Corruption prefers anonymity.”  Lucinda wondered if he just made that up or had been saving it for just the right time.

“And the windows being opened, folks even had to be careful what they said inside the house,” the new guy observed. “Those houses are close together and have small front yards. People walking by, or in the house next door were part of the conversation whether you wanted them to be or not.” Sounded like he might have been speaking from some level of experience. “I grew up over on Maple Avenue,” he grinned.

“What happens when you bring a new car home now?” Pastor Peterson posed.

“When I brought the Honda home for the first time,” Chad reflected, “I hit the garage door button and had that bad boy inside the three car garage of the McMansion before any of the neighbors would have had a chance to see me.  Not that it woulda mattered.  I’ve never spoken to one of them, anyway, and we’ve been in the house for nearly a year.”

Pastor Peterson sat back and nodded.  Lucinda filled all the cups again.  Chad sat back in his chair, remembering the event.

“When I walked into the house, Prudence couldn’t even hear me over the air conditioning, stereo, and Rumba roving the imitation hardwood floors.  Had to yell at her to get her attention.”

“Probably not the first time you’ve yelled at her without the neighbors being able to hear,” Rusty said.  Nobody had a reply to that.  Not even the new guy who grew up over on Maple Avenue.  But it made everyone think a little.  Pastor Peterson brought it back to the Buick, like he was wrapping up a Sunday sermon over at the Almost United Methodist Church.

“In addition to a Fireball straight-eight, a Dynaflow transmission, a PreTronix ignition, a gunsight hood ornament, and Ventiports, this Roadmaster offered something else in 1949 that is no longer available today?” he asked.  His question hung in the air while everyone reflected on what we’d gained versus what we’d lost in the seventy-five years since this Buick pulled up to a bungalow for the very first time.

“So in 1949 we were more civil to each other, knew our neighbors better, and cared about community a whole lot more than we do now, just because of air conditioning” Chad reckoned.  “We were just a lot sweatier and didn’t smell as good?  Not sure about that trade-off.”

About then Rex Hall, owner of Rex Hall Drug, walked in and took a seat.  “You guys hear about the FOX News settlement?” he asked, wondering who the new guy was sitting at the table.