Abandoned Church - Texas

I love abandoned places. I've always been drawn to them; old schools and hotels, a lone house sitting in the middle of a corn field. I started exploring when I was a teenager, mostly because places were said to be haunted and a group of us would go out at midnight armed with flashlights. Later I started bringing a film camera along. I still have photos in a box somewhere, glossy sheets in paper envelopes, covered in smudgy fingerprints.

Last December Darrell and I drove down to Big Bend National Park on the Texas/Mexico border. We took small state highways and back roads on the lookout for anything interesting. We saw the steeple of this old Catholic church over mesquite trees in the distance and stopped to see it.

The front door was open, a hand lettered sign asking for people to respect this place of worship and not deface the church. It was quiet and cold, the sound of our footsteps loud. Behind the alter was a small room with one wall covered with built in drawers and closets, places for the priest to keep the things he'd wear during the service. It was beautiful; several of the stained glass windows broken but no one had covered the walls in graffiti.

I wish I'd taken more photos. I've decided it's better to overshoot than look at everything later and realize you didn't capture half the things you remember loving. Next time I won't let frozen fingers stop me.