Goodbye Farm

I didn't know how to write this post.  I still don't.  My father and my son and I went to visit my grandparents' farm for the last time this week.  I wanted to say goodbye to the barn and the farm.  It felt like a funeral.  The people that made it special, the memories, the souls - they weren't here anymore.  It was empty.  I guess that made it easier, barely.  Here then are my last pictures.  Although they are unnecessary.  Every corner of this place is written in my memory.

The porch has a "long view' across acres and acres. I used to sit on this porch and watch the barn swallows and bluebirds fly over this pasture.   You can see our hunting ridge, barely.  It's the white snow cap in the middle.  One the far left is an old beaver pond.

The little man saw an old wind chime on the porch and I held him up so he could play with it.  With each clear note I felt my grandfather's soul. I remember distinctly the first time it occurred to me that he would die, that I would someday be without him.  I was twelve years old maybe.  We were fishing in an old lonely watershed.  He was silhouetted against the sky.  

It was sunny and I didn't need a jacket.  And then a snow storm blew in across the fields.  There was a sudden rain of snow pellets.  It was time to leave.

My little man with his very own papa.