farmhouse

The photo on the top is the family farmhouse in Braxton County, West Virginia.  The people in the photo are my great grandfather and wife, my great uncle, my grandfather, and one of the grand sisters.  The photo was taken in front of their just built home, ca. 1904.

The photo on the bottom is the farmhouse ca. 2004, and now, in 2021 it has collapsed.  I took the photo on the bottom, and by accident I took one from the very same location as the photo from 1904.  I will never go back to the farm, it was sold in 1970-ish over the strenuous objections of the entire family; I remember it from the 1960s.  It is now a testament to the ravages of time.

It makes me sad.  There is only myself and my sister-in-law (cousin) that survive,  to remember, and I am 70 and she is 73.  There are kids from both of us, but they don't care, never having seen it in a living state.  My family went to the farmhouse every summer for 3 weeks, and SIL was there for the entire summer, helping with cooking and canning.  The last time I was there, to get the mirror in the living room, there was a tree growing inside the house, deer in the yard, snake skins in the bathroom, stripped of anything usable.  I don't know why the mirror was left, or why the owners let it all fall to ruin. I guess they only wanted the land.  They are all gone now too; don't know who pays the taxes.