Excising the Heart

Some say a barn is like a cathedral; a vast expanse of space holding back the elements, connecting people to a larger power. A tie to nature. A link to the past.

Every church has its priest. This was the role my grandfather assumed. Raised on a small dairy farm that saw three generations living and working together, he knew such places to be sacred. They represented the heart of a farm, the livelihood of a family. Only after his death did the barn succumb to ruin.

I wish I could have saved it, but it was not mine to save. I never milked a cow, bundled hay, or shoveled manure. No, this was my childhood playhouse. A place of fantasy.

For a time my family kept the barn propped up as an oversized lawn ornament, but soon discovered a thin coat of red paint does little to mend a leaking roof and crumbling foundation. It takes a truly symbiotic bond for a barn to endure. When this bond breaks, we, the surviving heathens, are forced to choose between slow rot and swift destruction. We chose the latter. This film serves as my personal documentation of the process.