Monday, August 9, 2010

Camper's Delight

I seem to have blogger's block, but I will do my best.

My family owns a campground and has since I was 2. My mother grew up here and then tried to move 1 town away but came back to run the show and then we grew up here. Keep in mind, I like to call it a campground because that portrays a better picture than a trailer park, which is what my mother calls it. This is what I see when you say TRAILER PARK.

This is what I see when you say CAMPGROUND.

So, please remember, we grew up next to a CAMPGROUND, not a TRAILER PARK. And at no point did we ever live IN the trailer park or campground. Not that there's anything wrong with that...

So, I really wish I'd taken a picture when I could sense there was something blog worthy forming, but I felt that I would intrude on these people's privacy so I left it alone. But here's the story and you will spend the whole time wishing I had snapped a few pictures. My mother told me that a couple had arrived with a trailer and paid in full for the two weeks (our max so that we don't end up like a
but she still wasn't feeling good about it. I found out when I walked down to see it. It had been stripped. All of the lights that should have been on the outside were missing. The metal thing that covers a hot water heater on the outside was missing and they didn't even have one. The license plate was held on with zip ties. They weren't hooked up to the water because they had no pipes inside. The electrical work was missing so they had run an orange extension cord inside. Oh boy. And they smoked like chimneys. And they had 2 dogs who didn't bark much. And they drove a beat up truck that was just as bad as the trailer and they told my mother it didn't reverse.

And then I noticed the "curtains". In most trailers, you have either crank out windows or, in most new models, windows that slide open on a track. These people had some crank out windows. And then they had some pop out windows. This meant that they broke the seal on the bottom of a window that wasn't meant to open and they propped the glass out by putting a piece of 2 by 4 to keep it propped open. And then their "curtains" were pieces of plywood that they had set against the windows so that only about the top 6 inches were clear glass. You can imagine that this wasn't going to last long here in a so my mother spent every day wishing they would go away. And then her wish came true. They took the truck and the dogs and NOTHING ELSE and called her from another state and said they were sorry to run out but they had been working for some very rude/mean people who gave them that trailer and then tried to make them remodel it while living in it. She gave the number of the woman who they worked for and said that maybe they would come take it back.

And then I went down to see what they had left behind. For starters, the trailer, all windows cranked/propped open as wide as could be. A huge load of lumber that was going to be used to remodel the thing. Clothes on a clothesline. Food. Like they were in the middle of a meal and one said let's go and the other said OK and they just took off. The trash they had ripped out of the trailer to remodel it. And my mother stood there doing the I Told You So dance until she turned blue.

Amazingly, when the employers were called to come retrieve this trailer, they did. But they left the crap. Until today. I went over to put it all in the truck to haul it to the dump (so it wouldn't look like we lived in a and it was all gone.

Now if only I had taken some pictures so we could all have such fashionable curtains. And I could sell them on my etsy.
**********************************************************************************
UPDATE:  After I had posted this, about week later, I saw the trailer and posted this:
 You can't forget the couple with the sad trailer from Camper's Delight earlier this week. Sadly, I had no pictures. UNTIL LAST NIGHT!!! There I was, minding my own business while running in a road race, two towns away, when what did I spy with me little eye?I know, I almost had to come to a complete stop during the race, I was so shocked. One would not forget a sad case such as this, and even though I was several hundred yards away, I knew what I saw. And this made sense. The part I didn't tell you in my earlier post is that the mean employer in this case is a family member of a very notable, politically famous family here in the region. As I ran past a parking lot that has recently been named after another family member in this prominent family, I happened to glance over and see that that's the trailer, so indeed, the employer really is a member of this particular famous family. I hadn't believed it until then. So after I ran, I had to go back and take some pictures.This is a back corner of the trailer and looks distinctly like it was crushed. And the glass is broken, which is odd, because these are crank out windows, not the other kind I mentioned that they had propped open with 2 x 4s.Here's the missing water heater box.
And here are the missing lights, wonder how they got it down the road. All of this gave me a chuckle because it's now like this trailer and its saga is following me!

6 comments:

  1. I love the pictures, perfect way to distinguish between campground and trailer park! ANd interesting story, sometimes it's better to know less about the backgrounds of certain people. :-)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Have you met Karen from http://willoaksstudio.blogspot.com/? You two have so much in common.

    ReplyDelete
  3. No, haven't met her. Is she white trash, I mean a redneck, I mean did she grow up next to a trailer park too?

    ReplyDelete
  4. When you say campground, I picture it the same way as you. We have plenty of state parks here and campgrounds and that is all you see is fifth wheels, tents, rv's, etc. To bad you didn't get pictures.

    Thanks for stopping by my blog it is much appreciated.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Ohmygoodness! They left the trailer? How totally bizarre, but very funny:)

    ReplyDelete
  6. This is totally funny!

    ReplyDelete

I love comments almost as much as I love summer. I reply to all comments except those ridiculous anonymous comments offering me dirty deeds and real estate. When you leave your comment, please make sure your own settings will allow me to reply to you. Nothing makes me sadder than replying to your comments and then realizing it’s going to the no-reply@blogger address!