There are, of course, advantages to the spit shiny and new, to the things with a high gloss and the places that still smell of fresh timber and a bright coat of paint. A comfy leather couch. A just-off-the-lot car. The custom built home. I appreciate all of these things for what they are. But not everything is better new.
I’ve forever been drawn to the places that represent a time gone by, that speak of a history still embedded in the bones of their architecture, where ghosts brush past you on the breeze and the bells that toll may or may not be of your imagination. The juxtaposition of a historic church set against a metropolitan skyline thrills me, as do abandoned places that gape, sad and forlorn, against the cerulean sky.There are stories here, people laughed and cried here, someone built these buildings with hands and sweat and triumph. Cities like Charleston, Savannah, even newer old places like Tombstone (touristy though it may be) draw me like bees to honey, like a moth to a flame. The dust doesn’t keep me away – in fact, it draws me in, reminds me that even under layers of dirt and time there are wonders to behold.
This abandoned place was an old high school I captured last month in Macon on my almost-last trip back east to GA. There it stood, alone on a wide roadway, nothing to neighbor it, nothing to speak of its age, but calling to me still, asking me to tell its story, maybe one last time.
