Monday, February 11, 2019

Day 117, "Every picture has a story"
Today's picture is about more than the barn on the farm.  It is about old and new, priorities, fun, love of doing and perhaps family as well.  So where do I start?
     I will start with Dad.  He was, without question, a very talented man.  Stories have it that he and his brother Halvor purchased the first combine in the area and they went around doing work for others.  I think that is true!  Before he and Mom were married he spent 2 winters in Aberdeen studying at a school for mechanist.  His work on the farm certainly was proof that he was a good student.  He went through 8th grade but in so many ways was a very educated man.  Winters found him in his chair close to the oil burning stove in the living room reading gun or camera magazines.  He took 300+ wedding pictures before he retired.  I should add that Mom was a big part of that.  He was a hunter through and through and before his eyesight was somewhat compromised he could out shoot most.  I remember MANY times he would come home with a turkey or ham from a trap shoot.  He spent many days in the winter tracking fox and most of the time coming home with at least one.  Sure, he did sell the hide of a few $$ to his friend Crandle but it was not about money, it was about the hunt and the "winning" while the fox lost!  When rural REA came into being he wired our house and did the same for neighbors.  I still remember the time we got a yard light.  SO much fun in the night time as we would get company and play hid and seek outside withe the yard light on but dark shadows everywhere!  
     Having said all that he was a farmer, kind of!  He relied on the farm for an income but as time went by the farm was proof that Dad was not a farmer at heart, he was a photographer, a hunter, a electrician, a traveler and more.   Time would tell you the first two were the most important things in his life.  If anyone reads this they can take from the last sentence what they want but the story is:
  • There is a gas tank by the barn.  It is sitting right where we would unload hay into the hay barn.  Of course that means no use for the hay barn and the gas tank, well that replaced the in ground tank that was under our gas pump when we grew up.  The HUGE hole in the barn was his garage as we never had a garage after ours blew down in the early 50s.  One can see the barn siding that was cut out leaning against the barn
  • The old car sitting there is one I am sure broke down and instead of getting rid of it there it sat as a testament to OLD.
  • One can see the back of the combine which at the time was not used any more.  In the last years of farming Dad hired the crop to be taken off the land.  
  • To the right of the barn one can see tall grass and no fence.  As we children grew up that was the barn yard fenced in.  In the winter, when we had to get hay in the hay rack, we would open the gate and feed the cows hay off the rack.
  • If I look close I can see several window panes broken.  I think they were broken years and years before this picture.
  • As one can see this is certainly representative of a dilapidated farm perhaps wanting more but settling for less in its old age.
  • As for the fun.  The light pole near the barn door is the pole I would shimmy up to get on the roof.  I could then lie on the far side of the roof and dream of what life was like in a different part of the world.
  • The barn itself is a haven of memories that stretch from overflowing water tanks, to milking cows by lantern, to shooting sparrows in the night, to playing tag on the rafters to caring for little calves after birth to playing ball against the south side of the barn to shooting baskets in the hay barn with a rubber ball and much more.  
Oh yes, "for sure" the barn held many many memories and told so so much about life.  I write this not to say Dad was wrong or to say he was a bad father.  I loved him with all my heart but his life is certainly one that is testimony to "life is often about the heart".

The FP is gone and I need to dress for tennis at 7:30.

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