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Some porches are littered with beer bottles, overflowing ashtrays, and sagging couches heavy with the scent of rot. Some have lights that work, and others don't. Some are enclosed with screen or glass, while others are open to the elements. Many porches are immaculate and have white wicker furniture angling each of the four corners. A few have mounds of moldering clothes and newspaper weeklies in stale plastic bags scattered under rows of silver mailboxes. Occasionally there will be a pet dish on the porch, overturned, or upright with a few kernels of food stuck to the sides. Sometimes there will be a pet in the porch also, who will lunge (if a dog) or creep (if a cat) towards the door when I open it.

I once read that a porch is supposed to be a place of transition, a gradual transformation the visitor passes through before entering the house. I usually do not enter the house, and so only get the effect of the porch. I watch my breath rising toward a skeleton of nothingness.