Welcome to The Trailer Park Files. A work of creative nonfiction about a trailer park that may or may not exist. One whose citizens and denizens may or may not be rooted in truth.

Child: “Dad, did you see his new dog? It’s so cute!”

Father: “He talks to it all the time though.”

Child: “Maybe it’s a therapy dog.”

It is not a therapy dog, just Boo. I do talk to my dogs all the time, though. This is just one example of how there are no secrets in the trailer park. My neighbor is a cool dude, but we have different ideas on dogs. He has three Cane Corsos who get treated well enough, but to him they are dogs, not companions. Having three intact males over 100lbs each makes him feel powerful, and who am I to judge? For him, the dogs seem to be a symbol of masculinity as well as an extremely effective way to keep people out of his yard. That is why he finds it so strange that I own three marshmallows that I coo at and give constant love to. My wife is out of town a lot. I need to use my words in her absence.

One more thing on the neighbor’s dogs. They are giant, scary, and have a picture-frame-rattling bark, but after living 15 feet from them for years, they have chilled. Now, when I put in a window fan or something, I get much friendlier blarps than their normal bark, which screams ‘halt!’ We’re down. I still ain’t reaching over that fence, though.

You hear dogs all day here. In my personal experience living in a loud place, you just tune it out. My neighbor’s dogs in particular I never hear. He’s always apologizing and shit no matter how many times I sincerely state that I don’t mind at all. My dogs also go bananas when I’m not home or when I have company, so I’m not going to get mad about it. People are so weird, man.

He only knows I talk to my gang because of our close proximity. I don’t talk to anybody except my neighbors on either side, but even so the whole park knows my life and I know way more than I would like to about many of my fellow residents. We live on top of each other, you see, and our tin cans need the windows open for three seasons out of the year. I know all.

Needless to say, filming video essays is strange since my personal office space is in the front of our house near the road. Hearing a guy seemingly talking to himself about the profound influence Romance of the Three Kingdoms for Nintendo had on his future studies is probably odd.

I get a pass on being a pot-smoking, rap-blaring, nature-loving hippie with happy but crazy dogs by trying to be cool to everybody. See, here in the park, factions have formed. I am neutral. Come over, smoke a fatty with me, and talk about anything that isn’t park drama. Let it go.

Nobody actually does this, of course. My neighbors continue to go tit-for-tat in perpetuity.

There is stuff to be angry about, mind you. We are a co-op, so the board that makes decisions is made up of us. When anything goes tits up, the board gets the blame. In defense of the populace, we have been on a boil order for 10 years and our well did dry up once. We also have 50-year-old water infrastructure. When a pipe was in danger of bursting, instead of admitting it to the town, a member of our board slithered down to the pump house and turned the water pressure way down. Nobody knew at the time. We were showering after midnight over here. Someday, I will write an essay on firsthand experience with water scarcity in the United States.

Don’t get it fucked up, I LOVE living here. It’s so cheap. Cheap for many reasons, but cheap nonetheless. This financial flexibility has allowed my wife and me freedom that many folks don’t have. It’s amazing. The roof leaks and the pipes freeze, but even this cannot dampen our spirits.

The neighbors are all interesting as well. Many of them are pretty mellow, and we have a lot of older folks who are all pretty chill. There is this one lady who walks her dog, Freddy, and she gives you the hairy eyeball when you drive by no matter how slow or how far away you are. It’s like a game trying not to get the hairy eye. Someday, man. Someday.

If you are enjoying this deep dive into the inner workings of a trailer park, part 2 will be dropping soon.

Please, stay tuned for more from The Trailer Park Files,

JTC