HOW TO BUILD A PORCH

It has always been my dream to build a porch , but I have never really had the time. I guess that it is a little bit cliché. I was not raised by one of those fathers who is always in is shed, working on construction projects. My dad was, by contrast, very hesitant to take on any home repair projects. He would always hire contractors for anything that needed to be done. Wherever my idea to build a screened porch came from, it certainly did not come from him, or his side of the family. He did not know how to build a porch, and would never have bothered to find out.

I must admit, when I started looking at how to build a screened in porch, and realizing how difficult it all was, I did consider hiring a contractor for a moment. It would be so easy to, instead of learning step by step this difficult new skill, give the job over to someone more qualified, someone who knows already how to build a porch. Major home renovation is intimidating, especially if you happen to be someone like me, someone who has barely even lifted a saw in his life, let alone done a major construction job like building a porch. How could I learn how to build a porch? I barely knew how to saw the wood.

I was saved by my friend Joe. Joe is what you might call a man's man. He loves tools, football, beer, and anything macho like that. With him, it is practically a matter of pride to know things like how to build a porch. Whatever he did not know, he knew where to look, and quickly he took over the project. He would come over almost everyday after work got out to work on the project, I would by us a case of beer, and we would get to work, slowly burning the evening away, sawing and hammering until the sun went down. To be honest, he later told me, he did not know anything about how to build a porch in the first place, but he had done enough home projects to be able to figure it out without too much effort. When I look at the results of his project, it is pretty clear that he made good on his promise to help me no matter what it took. The porch looks wonderful.