BARNS

No matter what roads I explore, if I see an old barn, I will always execute an illegal U-turn and grab the Nikon. I love old barns. I never questioned why until I began writing these stories.

My Grandmother’s brother, Harry Whiting and his family lived down the hill from my house in Berkshire, Massachusetts. I spent most of my childhood in the woods behind my house or pestering my great uncle at his dairy farm.

In addition to sixty Holsteins and their calves, Harry had a couple of old horses and acres of pastures and corn fields. A pond and brook, beside which grew forget-me-nots and watercress, ancient apple trees and wonderful old tractors and trucks.

The barn, built in 1885, was the most magical place of all. 

Above the cows, on the second floor, was a haymow that reached three stories up to the inside of the roof, which was held up by giant, hand hewn, 12”x12” timbers. In the summer, the bales were stacked to the roof and organized around huge wooden tunnels containing fans to dry the moist hay.

In autumn and winter, as the hay was fed to “the girls”, as Harry called them, the haymow became a maze of mountains of differing elevations from which to climb and leap.

It was heaven to my ten-year-old self.

I once read a definition of Nostalgia as a sentimental longing or wistful affection for the past, typically for a period or place with happy personal associations

To say that I feel nostalgia when I think of the barn of Crestalban Farm would be an understatement. More farm stories will follow.

Written July 29, 2021