Although I’ve not spent much time in barns, I’ve been accused of being raised in one.

The iconic southern rural barn, which once dotted the landscape with gambrel roofs, painted red clapboard siding and large doors suitable for an International tractor to pass through, are slowly melting into the ground from which they sprouted many decades ago.

Now, many new farm structures are metal, which ring hollow and lack the warmth and soul of old heart pine beams and hay lofts, where children misbehaved and an occasional kiss was stolen.

Places where livestock were reared, grain was stored, tools were forged, tobacco hung and moonshine steeped, are now antiques left over from the early working farm. Now, many new farm structures are metal, which ring hollow and lack the warmth and soul of old heart pine beams and hay lofts, where children misbehaved and an occasional kiss was stolen.

Now, old barns are being dismantled and sold, piece by piece, for the valuable relics they’ve become, not in whole, but in part. Ingredients used to construct these hubs of farm life are now coveted by milling companies for furniture, flooring and repurposed for new home construction. All are honoring gestures to that which gifted its pieces, but the land it once anchored is missing a piece of its history.

Like hungry hippos, buyers are scrambling to find the next tobacco barn slated to fall. Old growth trees, which were once harvested and shaped by the caring hands of skilled carpenters who lived in these farming communities, are now the cats meow of fine living.

Because I am a writer, not a fighter, I could dream up a dozen metaphors and analogies to pair with this little lamb’s wool thread I am spinning. I believe the one which weighs heaviest on my pitchfork is, some of us have lost a vital connection to our past. Divorcing our association to the southern farm has distanced our understanding of where our food comes from.

We’ve forgotten the value of our ancestors. Those patriarchs and matriarchs who have melted into the soil where they were last laid, have been written off as a non-essential piece of our historical fabric. The generations, from which we were born, cultivated and harvested what they needed to build the foundation for their families. It is a fountain of wealth and wisdom we seem to no longer tap.

Our “grands” and “great grands” honed their lives for what was good, pure and right. They built life giving structures for us to admire, but now, some of these structures have been left for ruin. If only we could, like pickers at an antique show, sift through these old proverbial barns of the past, take what is valuable to repurpose, but also search for that which our ancestors intended to leave behind, which has grown exponentially in value. Things like wisdom, resourcefulness, respect, character and the dignity found in hard work and providing for your neighbor.

The investment they once made in us are yielding dividends we can now claim as our own. They have passed down their precious legacy for us to enjoy. We just gotta reach back far enough to find it.