Historical or Just Plain OLD?

The house at left is not our house but it's probably what our house looked like when it was built around 1913. The original building, constructed of adobe bricks almost a foot thick, was a single story home consisting of two bedrooms, a kitchen and pantry and a central living room with a massive stone fireplace. Set into the fireplace are two heart shaped rocks. There is also a heart shape formed into one of the original concrete stoops. We can only guess at the story behind these. But, it's neat to think that at the very first this house was filled with love. It's like the makings of a cowboy romance novel, isn't it?


One of the original owners, bless him, planted a good number of cottonwood and elm trees around the place. The original driveway slanted up the hill passing the big main barn that burned down many years ago and the smaller milking barn, which still stands today. That and the three grain bins that survive are proof that there were once productive days of farming here. The section that this homestead originally owned may well have been planted to winter wheat, and maybe even corn once upon a time.

Our house is on a little hill just east of an old Colorado train stop town, founded in the 1860s. Since the house is a landmark, everyone has a story about it. One old guy told us that he learned to break horses here and was thrown into the old corale fencing many a time in the process. Many people boarded their horses here. The superintendent of schools lived in this house back in the fifties. We've heard from the old timers that this place was a working dairy back in the day. Another old farmer told us that he remembers a teenage kid delivering milk from the back of a horse drawn wagon during WWII, in order to conserve gasoline. It was a pig farm for a while, too. But, it's just been a dry land hobby farm now for many years.

By the time we came along about ten years ago, the old house and outbuildings had seen better days. Most of the trees were still hanging in there, but just about everything else was a shambles. So, we set to fixing it all up as best as we could.

As we've cleaned out the outbuildings, removed and built fencing and dug gardens, we've stumbled across many artifacts. And lots of tangled up barbed wire.

So, what else are ya gonna do with a bunch of old artifacts and barbed wire ~ but make a wreath out of it? As we find bits and pieces of history, we tuck it into the wreath. It makes for an interesting western-looking display on the side of the house. Like so:

Some pieces have fallen off, but here it is right now and some of its "decorations," below:
A bit of an old "sad iron"
One of the four rusted old horseshoes in there.

Here's the head of an old hammer.
One of the old medicine bottles we've found.The casing of an old pocket watch

But Really...

I won't lie to you and pretend that living in history doesn't have its down sides. Like, have you ever heard of a grease trap? Well, if you haven't, you don't want to know. We're also the proud owners of an ancient 75' well. All new parts, pumps, and tank, mind you, but our water is so hard, we have to pay our water softener time and half with vacations just so it won't walk out on the job.

There is not a straight line in or outside of the entire house; it was built before codes existed and everything was "eyeballed." The roofline is so steep, it's impossible to fit it with gutters, and the foundation consists of whatever odds and ends of brick and rock the original builder could scrape together. Every time the wind blows, we imagine we can feel the house stretching its arms out to hold its hat on. But, in spite of all that, it truly is rock solid.

(That house up there is not ours, thank goodness...)

Honestly, when the wind blows a gale, like it does here on the plains most of the time, we barely hear it inside the house, due to the foot-thick walls. And it's a good thing the house is airtight, because we don't have central heat, but rely on a '50s era propane furnace located in the center of the house, and a woodstove in the dining room.

Because it was all so dated, we've had to replace every bit of plumbing on the entire property, and, well, I won't get into the electrical, except to say I can't iron and listen to the radio in my room if anyone in the room upstairs has static electricity on their sweater...

That's history for ya. Ya gotta love it. Or something.

But, it's all good. There really is a different feeling to living in an old house, a feeling of lives lived here. I like our part in providing that continuity of hard work ~ like fixing fences, washing dishes and hanging laundry ~ that have gone on in this place for so long.

Besides, someone's got to keep the ghosts company.

(Have I mentioned the ghosts?)