Derelict in the Dale

With COVID still a prominent part of life, and especially with the rising case numbers, I have been keeping a low profile. All my usual weekend activities have been curbed and with no events planned or meetups arranged I've been running solo. A few bike rides, a few hikes, gardening, plus plenty of reading thrown in have kept me occupied. I've turned down a few requests to go exploring with friends but have still been keeping an eye out while traveling country roads, hoping to see an interesting building to investigate.
One old house that I kept passing by intrigued me, walls of bare wooden boards and a weathered tin roof kept beckoning me from below in a valley as I drove by, and finally I relented. I hid the car on  side road then trudged down a steep hill through tall grass to see it close up.

A locked shed, and a porch with a broken toilet half falling through busted floor boards offered little photo opportunities at the front, so I plodded through the long grass towards the back, praying I wouldn't be taking home a colony of tick hitch hikers. Grasshoppers jumped from one grass stem to another in front of me and to the right I spotted a dank dark pond shrouded with hanging foliage and the obligatory half sunk car tire in the middle. As I turned around the corner I had to watch where I was placing my feet, hidden broken bricks and rocks beneath the grass tripped me, so it wasn't until I neared the door that I finally looked up, because I was suddenly aware that many birds were angry with me.

I clambered up to the doorway and peered in. Swallows chattered and screamed on the stair landing and I spotted a couple of nests clinging to the wall. As I stood watching, the birds swept in and out of the door, swooping past me, and I was reminded of my little resident tree swallow who had successfully raised two babies in my back yard. I felt immensely guilty that I'd invaded their space and determined that my visit would be short and swift, feeling a little mournful at the same time because I'd be unable to stay and concentrate on getting some good photos in the first abandoned property I'd been in for months. But I was now acutely aware that there were eggs or babies that needed their mothers' attention and so I hurried forwards into the hallway.

The lighting was great inside, casting sunlight and shadows throughout the broken interior. I was aware of interesting bottles and decaying material, shattered furniture and much paperwork scattered around, but those birds behind me were not letting up, constantly and furiously berating me for having the audacity to enter their abode. Without investigating these pieces of interest further I instead snapped a couple of photos of a parlor, and the side porch through old distorted glass, and then walked carefully to the stairs.

And no, I wasn't going to be permitted entry to that floor; the swallows shrilled and increased their swooping activity. I swear if they had got bombs they would have dropped them on me. I quickly shot a photo through a half closed door of an old jacket and hangers, and then backed out of the house, the screaming birds' voices rising to, it seemed to me, a crescendo.
I was actually immensely relieved to be back outside and made my way around the side of the house as quickly as possible, avoiding bricks and potholes, but managing to spot the worst termite damage I've ever seen on a home. The birds were still swooping above in the sky, but they were quietening down a little, a couple entering the door before I'd even turned the corner. I felt glad to leave them to their motherly duties and hoped they wouldn't have any other disturbances for a while.

One last photo from the front of the house by the shed and then I ambled, a lot more leisurely now, towards an old barn where I'd spotted some beat up vehicles. I couldn't hear the swallows at all, instead a low insect hum filled the air. No damp dust or debris stank out here, just the sweetness of hay and wild flowers. I stood, breathing deeply, and relishing the coolness of the shade thrown down by the bent and warped wooden planks of the barn walls. It was glorious to just be still, enjoying the warm country air against my face, the perfume of summer, the freedom of not wearing a mask, which I have to for much of my day at work. I walked through the grass, exploring the rusted pieces of forgotten farm machinery, dark ivy slowly pulling up a blanket of leaves to hide them from the world. A couple of bleached trucks stood in the sun, their paint revealing little of the original color, wheels sunk deep in the meadow as the grasses and flowers decorated their sides more prettily than spray on paint ever could.
I looked over to the old farmhouse, wondering if those swallows had finally calmed down and were once again back on their nests in that dismal, dark, but at least cool and dry, hallway. I'd likely not even be a distant memory by dusk. Anyway, I hoped not. It was time for them to settle down for the approaching evening and time for me to don the mask, perpetually hanging around my neck, as I drove to the store to shop for dinner.