This is where I read. At least this time of year, when the summer evenings are long and the light is good until well into the evening. It’s warm, and bright, and slowly over the past three years and a bit, I’ve planted enough flowers that there is always something blooming just in eyesight.

Many of the flowers around my porch are not just bright, but fragrant, so sitting and reading fills more than once sense. There’s the wind, the crickets and tree frogs, the perfume, all combining together in some sort of sensual symphony that plays in the background as I read.

My porch is not the only place I read. In fact, at some time or another you can probably catch me reading in every room in the house. But there is something particularly nice about reading on the front porch, surrounded by flowers, waving to people as they drive past the house, and the sunlight bright on the pages.

I feel very grateful to have had good places to read over the years. No matter how well life treated me, or how bad things were, I have often had wonderful porches to read on, places where I didn’t just sit, but was enveloped by the world around me and where the afternoon and evening light was perfect; places where, should someone stop by, there was always another chair to share the moment and the place with.

I had a porch in my big old farmhouse in Virginia, and I loved reading there. But the house was way off the road and so many people probably never even noticed I was there. In the fifteen or so years I lived there, I don’t think one person every stopped by and visited while I read.

After my divorce, I had a charming little apartment in the basement of what had once been a college in Daleville, Virginia. To get to the apartment, you had to go under the stairs to the main building, where there was a covered porch, always shaded, perfect for reading on a summer’s day. But it was somewhat hidden, and except for a few neighbors who knew I was there (and there kids, who were always around), few people came by.

There’s no real reason to share my little porch with you tonight. I just felt like it. I am grateful to you who read here, just as I am grateful for my porch chair with it’s flowers and perfume. So it seemed, as I finished reading tonight, like a good time to share my special spot with you, and invite you in to a little piece of my life.

Should you ever find yourself in West Pawlet, Vermont, I live in the  only blue house in my very small town. If you see me outside reading, stop by. Introduce yourself. And share my porch for a while. I’ll probably have some sun tea in the icebox.  It’s a peaceful place. A place worth sharing.

Tom