The old wood stove hasn't brought warmth to this abode since Mr. Edward (Ed) Elmer Wickman passed away in July of 2004, at the age of 80. His wife Mrs. Margaret (Lois) Wickman had passed away back in January of 2001. Ed had a very large family that included 23 grandchildren, 18 great-grandchildren, and 4 great-great-grandchildren. Even with the large family though, the loss of his wife was heartbreaking. I can only barely begin to imagine how lonely those last three and a half years must have been.
On this day in April of 2011, the doors could barely hold themselves up on their aged hinges, and the yellow curtains on the windows were disintegrating. In the kitchen, my hands pushed aside a bright curtain and revealed the staircase to the second floor. Red and gold wallpaper adorned the staircase. A fuzzy green blanket with silk trim was hanging at the window high above a bright blue banister constructed of 2x4s. The banister gave way to striped wallpaper, peeling to old orange painted drywall crumbling to outer brick wall.
The Killer Bees
The Ultimate Warrior
Paul Mr. Wonderful Orndorff
Bret The Hitman Hart
Andre The Giant
Ric Flair
George The Animal Steele
Brutus The Barber Beefcake
Mr. Perfect
Honky Tonk Man
Kamala
Kicking the baseball between my feet on the second floor, photographing the baby blue Westinghouse Nail Dryer and Hair Dryer all-in-one with fat ass vacuum hose and colour matched case, I pondered how long it had been since some kids threw this ball around, and who those kids may have become? What became of the girls that used this baby blue Westinghouse equipment? These are the questions that push me forward as an explorer.
The Nasty Boys
Greg The Hammer Valentine
The Fabulous Moolah
Elizabeth
The Model Rick Martel
Time ravages. Time seems to go faster everyday with the ratio of tomorrows to yesterdays shrinking at a feverish pace. Much like is happening to us in these fading moments we try to to capture in photographs and memories, time eventually had its way with this old house in Hastings, Ontario.
Heaps of wallpaper have surrendered, given up on life and leaped to the ground, left piled in mass graves. Colour was the only thing still showing signs of life inside the house on this spring afternoon. The blue and yellow kitchen walls shining brighter than the cold distant sun, hiding behind a dark shield of clouds and dense precipitation in a foreboding black and grey sky. The curtains and the wallpaper, the pile of clothing and the bright blue banister, all alive with colour. Us, alive with passionate excitement and intrigue. The freshly wounded corpse of a wet dog that I couldn't seem to muster the strength to photograph, beside a rotting wood pile out back, remind us of just how short lived and precious this alive feeling really is. Nothing lasts.
Ev e ryt h in g f a ll s a pa ar t .
We too, will abandoned these shells, these skeletons, these houses...
The Fridge
Macho Man Randy Savage
Hacksaw Jim Duggan
The Matador Tito Santana
The $Million $Dollar $Man Ted DiBiase
The British Bulldogs
Jake the Snake
Hillbilly Jim
Ravishing Rick Rude
Demolition
One Man Gang
Ricky the Dragon Steamboat
Legion of Doom
The time will come for each and every one of us. Until it does, live life to the fullest.
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