Lately I've been watching YouTube videos made by people who consider themselves to be "urban explorers". Some are so obnoxiously loud and try so hard to be witty that I just can't watch them but when I find videos by Tiki Trex and Dan Bell and others who just do their videos in a very homey, conversational tone, I love watching those. However, when I see some of the abandoned buildings, many absolutely beautiful in their day but now just sitting and rotting away, my heart aches. It's like a feeling of homesickness. Many of the buildings are from days gone by but some have been abandoned more recently, I can't help wondering why someone left these breathtaking homes and institutions to just crumble. Why doesn't somebody at least salvage the stained glass windows and immense fireplace surrounds and other gorgeous elements of the day? Why can we afford to just waste all that? When I was watching some of those last night, it occurred to me that maybe the pain I feel so acutely for some of them is a result of my having lived a past life there.
Once in awhile, a home will have police tape in it. That's pretty chilling, wondering what happened there that the police taped it off at one time. Normally those are the newer, more modern dwellings where not only is police tape there, but so is every single thing the people owned, including their food, clothing, children's beds and toys.
Sometimes it's easy to read the story in the stuff that's left. Like a home where there are disability aids. In one of them was a shower chair used by the disabled or elderly. Part of the home showed that normal life went on there for many years, but then going further back toward the bedroom area things that indicated an elderly or ill person lived there at the last. This home had a pair of crutches leaned up in a closet, the padded arm rests all taped up with silver duct tape. This was a person who had little money but lingered a long time and at one point would have used those crutches. Obviously the former resident had gradually deteriorated until even with help, they either couldn't live untended anymore or maybe they'd died.
Last night one of the Dan Bell videos was filmed in a house where a psychic/Tarot reader lived. It was really a pretty little house. I'd have loved to live and work there. But the upstairs was all about children. It looked like a baby and a little girl of maybe 4 or 5 had lived in those rooms, but it hadn't been touched. It was spotlessly clean although being children's rooms, toys and some clothing were all strewn around. That's normal. The walls and carpets seemed all nice and clean, as though these were children who were well cared for and loved.
Another video was of a "dead mall" that was all empty but the power was still on and I could hear "elevator music" playing. Eerie. It made me wonder why such a big mall had been just left to rot and be vandalized.
In the Poconos Dan did a series of videos of the resorts that had been there up till the 90's. Swingers resorts and honeymoon resorts, to name a couple of types. He's done a series of videos called "dead motels" that he's filmed.
For anyone who wants to spend a few hours just watching videos like this, I highly recommend Dan Bell's videos.
One of the resorts had been the place where a fugitive had hid out for weeks. His last name was Frein, I think. I forgot to Google the incident today. Instead housework was screaming at me so loudly that I cleaned my apartment instead. Don't you just hate when your home is so rude and demanding? I do but it produced results so I guess I can see the point.
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