mass mental

a mental hospital in winter. i found this place accidentally because i can't keep out when the signs say keep out. it was the most haunting surreal place i had seen outside of new orleans. i went back several times. in the middle of this sprawling empty complex of buildings, which was completely embedded in the woods, was a town square with a town hall style building with a clock, and a church. and a rotary. it was beautiful and foggy. i felt like i had found the abandoned set of some post-nuclear film. or the twilight zone. it was 1950 and it was empty. there was an untended nameless graveyard and an abandoned swimming pool that was completely covered in, so that the level of the weeds and soil was level with the edge of the pool. the diving board hung inches above the ground. the manacles attached to the cold ceramic claw foot tubs were silenced. the paint rejected the walls entirely, on it's way out, in every possible incarnation of industrial color. a history of poor choices. a screen door opened onto a courtyard like apple pies. wheelchairs and electric shock. so many sounds in the middle of the silence. layer upon layer upon layer in building after building after building. mass mental.