The windmill rusts in the afternoon sun. This is the barn on Empire Road and the final days are here. My husband, who serves as the village treasurer, informed me that last night at the village meeting the contract was approved to dismantle the barn. He didn't have a date, but it's slated for August. That means I have a few weeks to fill a 1 gig card with as many images of the old space as I can. And then it will be nothing but history and a kiddie playground for the 3/4 million dollar homes planted in the former cornfield.
I've decided to settle on something as a memento of my photographic relationship with the place. I don't know what though. Maybe a length of old chain, or a block and tackle, or perhaps I could take a small saw and remove the initials carved in the side of the hayloft.
Or perhaps I'll just take my memories, and the stories of concocted about the barns former life. I'm not sure.
4 comments:
Whose initials, a young farm boy carving the initials of the little girl in pigtails he has his eye on? Or initials of the farmer carved whtn the barn was built. What stories the barn could tell.
There are county records of the families who own the farm I would think. Wouldn't research into the family histories be fascinating? It's a shame that detailed records of life on the individual farms isn't available. It seems as important part of American History as anything else.
It's bittersweet, isn't it, to be the kind of people who have feelings for transient places? I feel the same way many times, but I also live in an area where "growth" is the predominant value, so change is all around me. I think I'd go for the carved initials myself.
The picture really express what you tell in the text. That beheaded windmill is a sad and silent witness of the sentenced place.
You really should scrapbook this stuff. You have quite a flair for writing and your pictures are quite stunning.
I'm saddened by progress in the name of sub-divisions. They're everywhere here. 5 years ago we were surrounded by corn fields. Now we're surrounded by houses.
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