“SO, WHO BELIEVES IN GHOSTS?”
alan skeoch
May 2018
The house and barn were abandoned a long time ago. People just walked away leaving everything behind…furniture, farm equipment, last mail delivery.
I bet some of you noticed the place on the road to Collingwood…west side between Duntroon and Collingwood. Nearly all gone now. Buildings sat there forlorn for
two decades or longer. Then a couple of years ago The house was
demolished but the barn still stands with the ghostly wreck of the giant threshing machine still standing on the threshing floor visible to passersby on the Collingwood road
since
many of the barn siding has been blown off by the winds of time.
Robert Root and I visited the site…with permission…sort of permission that is to say.
“Hey, Rooter, let’s ask the farm across the sideroad if we can go in to take some pictures.”
“Are they the owners?”
“Don’t rightly know.”
“Could Rooter and I take some pics of that’d abandoned farm?”
“We are not the owners.”
“We won’t touch a thing.”
“Suppose that is your business…not mine…go ahead.”
“Why has the place been abandoned…looks like it was once grand…”
“Dispute over the will…No one quite sure who owns what so no one can touch nothin’…or so we’ve been told.”
“Us? Promise not to touch a thing. Rooter is a Baptist…honest as the driven snow.”
“Not my business.”
So Rooter and I walked through the tall grass to the house and then out to the barn. No sign of life but lots
of evidence of a life that was once lived here. Books, letters, newspaper collection…phone book.
“Hey Rooter, look here. There’s even a section of the house for the hired man…at the back…separate.”
“Could be a hired woman, Alan.”
“Reckon?”
“Barn is full of things…Thresher, fanning mill, single horse plough, root pulper….”
“And the water pump still works…want a sip…a little brown.”
And that was an hour that both Rooter and I will never forget. Sad. Tragic. Like a love affair gone bad.
“Did you see any goats, Alan?”
“Nope. did you?”
“Nope…supposed to be ghost here, you know.”
WE MISSED THE GHOST…HE WAS OUT BACK WITH THE HARNESS…GETTING READY TO HARNESS UP HORSES…THE GHOST WAS THERE. (scroll down)
alan skeoch
May 2018