I've recently decided to start working on a new installation of the Kitchen Goddess and have been really inspired. Yet today I took a break from my regularly scheduled life and went on another summertime adventure in search of ... The Creepy. My sources told me about an abandoned house in the middle of nowhere, sharing space only with the Texas heat and bugs. I was assured that not a soul would be there. My sources were wrong ...
So on this sweltering hot August day, we headed out for a little hike in search of the perfect Creepy House that would give me the photos I wanted. After crossing a creek, wandering through what I hope was not poison oak or any of its friends, trekking through 2 pastures and dodging fire ant mounds, we came across a house out of an old horror movie.
As we walked up to the 1860s era house, the oak branches gave way and revealed the former glory of a mansion forgotten by everyone ... everyone but the caretaker and his partner who pulled up alongside us in their pickup to see how we happened to find the house ... in the middle of nowhere ... on private land ...
My source just about crapped her pants standing there, with the contemplation of the words 'criminal trespassing' going through her mind, and I could tell she was contemplating making a run for it. Yeah fine! Run off and leave me here, with the house being consumed by hungry vines...
...vines that consumed parts of the old house from the inside out, encasing the whole place in a very tight little silence.
Thankfully the caretaker was in a pleasant mood, and after chatting for a little bit, he allowed us to go closer and take some photos. I was floored when he swung out of the pickup truck, unwired the side door, and stepped aside to let us go inside...
...warning us to be careful inside, they left us inside & sat out under the oaks to drink some beer. I marvelled at the door that no one had cared for in decades, in a house still and empty for decades.
A kitchen that had once worn a sunshine-yellow coat of paint had rotted away to skeletal frames, peeling paint and gaping dark spots where once, a kitchen goddess of her own had graced the farmhouse domain, making preserves, canning beans, writing out recipes...
That's the thing about old houses. You can almost hear the stories of its prime, see its former primp through the faded wallpaper and smooth curves of the claw-foot tub...
The house was loaded with hidey-holes, with cubbies, with doors that opened to blank space with only 20 empty feet down to the ground below. The staircase led us up to vacant rooms that had empty light sockets swinging loosely and mirrors everywhere.
With many of the windows boarded up, the only thing moving was the wind at the top of the boards and the wasps.
Finally, in the midst of the biggest room, big enough to host a dance of some sort, was the master bath. I immediately decided pink was a color that should never appear in a bathroom, no matter how beloved the color. When its over a hundred years old, pink becomes rather ... creepy.
Or maybe it was the handprint on the doorsill. Pointing it out to my source, she gave a squeak, proclaimed she'd never seen that before, and began documenting it with her camera phone.
From the 2nd floor, I could hear the lull of the caretaker's voice, chatting with his partner and occasionally laughter drifted up to us.
Elaborate craftmanship of a different era had been discarded, forgotten. The old outhouse was shut in, with a tree standing posted in front of it, with tubs and sinks and desks and former belongings and artifacts stacked in barns and garages, moldering away to nothing.
We left the house and walked across the yards, with a windmill that had fallen on itself, water tanks -- once the pinnacle of high-tech --- lay exposed in the weeds and barns that were housing nothing more than an inventory of forgotten things
and after saying goodbye to the caretaker we walked back across the pasture, back towards our car, and back towards our own house, where thankfully, the bathroom is not pink.
But, adventures have a way of calling. And while its fun to watch the youth of today settle their differences in healthy expressions of homegrown violence, theres a whole 'nother world out there itching to be found.
We had an unbelievable drought here. Its lasted for just over two years, shriveling plants, decimating crops and sucking the rivers and streams of summertime dry. But, as the summer stitched itself closed with the advent of the school buses coming down our streets, the drought left town. 
I sat with my faithful oxen-headed dawg Mocha, to watch the rains as they began, filling buckets, washing away months and months of dust and debris. Mocha was so shocked at all the rain, I think he had forgotten exactly how all that works, with the water coming from the sky. It was like a sneaky all-day bath time.
I upped my daily allotted consumption of art museums and galleries, which makes me extra specially happy. 
I witnessed ice sculpture carvings by chainsaws; post-apocolyptic world-view installations with fur, latex and crossbows; stone sculptures of alabaster and granite and so much more. All helping me to get off my ass and get busy again.
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