Pink barn

I love old barns. We had one up north, a ramshackle, disintegrating, greying, roomy old building that housed our rabbits, goats, chickens, geese, and horse. Cosily enough, even though the old boards had shrunk over the years, leaving gaps we could see light through. But the fragrant bales of hay in the loft, the trampled hay on the floor provided warmth and comfort all winter.

Sometimes, in the summer, I would just stand there in the cool, listening to the interspecies chatter around me, revelling in the colours and shapes; the silvery grey of old wood, the ripe yellow-brown of the tail end of last year's hay, rich browns of horse and old leather saddle, pitchforks and pails, bags of feed smelling of grain and molasses, a smooth, round goose egg . . .

25 years later, the sight of a decaying barn brings it all back.

Small barn in afternoon sunlight, Fraser Valley.