CLOSED

I was driving through the small town of Eufaula, OK a couple of years ago and I saw an old building on the side of the road. It looked like it had been a small house or business. It’s walls were so soaked with moisture and rot that the whole building was a deep dark brown and were caving in on themselves. But rotted houses and buildings are not unique in Oklahoma as the population has remained stagnant for decades due to little opportunity. What caught my eye was that on the front door of this decaying building was a brand-new black sign in red letters that proclaimed the building was CLOSED. My head snapped back in surprise.

Obviously that building was CLOSED. Who in their right mind would enter that building had the sign said OPEN? It wasn’t even really a structure and more like a rotten pile of wood that vaguely resembled a building. Like a spaceship in the clouds. Or Jesus on toast. It took me a few minutes to ponder this and what possible explanation someone might have for the sign on that building and by the time I realized that I needed to get a picture; I was already a couple miles away and didn’t want to turn around. I could stop on the way back, I told myself. But on the way back, I searched for the building and could not find it. Maybe I’d gotten the town it was in wrong, so I searched every town along highway 69 and I still didn’t find it. To this day, every time I make the drive between Missouri and Dallas, I search along the highway for this building and I have yet to find even the building without the sign. I would be satisfied with a pile of rotten wood with the sign sitting on top but highway 69 would offer no such satisfaction. But the image remains stuck in my brain, like a long lost story I will never understan