Old buildings stir imagination

Something about an old barn, an abandoned, decades-old house or a dilapidated tool shed stirs my imagination. I wonder who might have lived there; I contemplate how many bales of hay were pitched into the loft; I reflect on the labor, the sweat, and the stress that went into tending the animals, mending harnesses and sharpening tools.

I can imagine families building these structures, creating homes, businesses and memories. And I speculate on what happened to the people. What led them away, moving to a better place, crop failure, tragedy or happenstance?

I see a lot of abandoned, dilapidated, battered buildings across the rural Southwest.  Each, I’m sure, has a story.