Doors. They serve as entries and exits. Beginnings and endings. These old doors, along the Outer Banks of North Carolina, have a little history and Laura’s Dad, Clarence Skinner, tells their story best in his own words and photographs:
“These old garage pictures are representative samples that still remain along the old beach road in parts of Nags Head and Kill Devil Hills. The garages were built very close to the road and used wooden ramps to connect the garage to the road. Beach houses were located closer to the ocean, often over three hundred feet behind the garage. Autos of that era, 30’s and 40’s, were two wheel drive and did not do well in sand, without skilled drivers and some preparation, like reducing tire pressure. Normal operation was to avoid getting your car in the sand, thus the wooden pallet type driveways and the garages close to the road. City folks also did not want their cars left exposed to the salt air. Of course, this meant that everything that was taken down by auto had to be hand carried from the garage to the beach house, through loose sand.”
These rough, beaten down, barely standing garage doors, have a rustic, nostalgic beauty about them. Like the tough times and challenges that many people have weathered this past year, these old relics are still standing. And the old doors with their rusty, salt-crusted hinges almost make you think they can still swing open. But, they don’t have to anymore. A new day has come. A better way of doing things. And although the old ways have been put aside for new ways, they have not been put aside.
They stand.
Salty reminders of silent strength.
So, if you’ve weathered a “nor'-easterner” storm of sorts this year, take a good look at these old structures. They stood when times were tough. And they lived to see better days. Days when doors opened to a better way.
“I see what you've done. Now see what I've done. I've opened a door before you that no one can slam shut. You don't have much strength, I know that; you used what you had to keep my Word. You didn't deny me when times were rough.” Revelation 3:8
The Velvet Lime Girls
