Tuesday evening, 8:37.
A crowd assembles on the front porch of the Professional Porch Sitters’ (PPS) Union Hall, Local 1339, in the Irish Hill neighborhood of Louisville, Kentucky. Tea is offered. It’s the South, so assume it’s sweet.
The folks gathering are generally busy people: artists, activists, revolutionaries, mothers, gardeners. People like you. They work hard, volunteer in their community, sit on boards, have schedules to keep and chores that need tending to. In spite of their many responsibilities, attendance at this meeting is good. Why?
Attendance is not required. There is no committee work, no minutes to approve, no budget report. No budget, for that matter. It’s an unmeeting kind of meeting. But it’s an important gathering to those on the now-crowded porch. The tea is gone, but there is beer. For grins, a little black book is passed around, and people record their attendance. Many use their porch-sitting aliases. Some write with their wrong hand. At the bottom of each page is scrawled ‘Agenda:’ but nobody adds an item. It’s there to remind us of what we don’t need. Remember, these are professionals.
The meeting is now in full swing. Andy is telling a story about the time his neighbor was visited by the windshield-wiper fairy. Hillary is plotting a new feature for her zine, Bejeezus. Mike offers up news about a secret free source for concrete bench tops. A neighbor walking her dog is enticed to join us. A lot is getting accomplished.
Reprinted from Orion (May/June 2006), the magazine dedicated to creative ideas and practical examples of how we might live justly, wisely, and artfully on Earth. Subscriptions: $35/yr. (6 issues) from Box 3000, Denville, NJ 07834; www.orionmagazine.org.
