Pilgrim in the Trailer Park

 August has come and gone so fast. I almost filled my journal with just August notes alone, things I heard on podcasts, phrases like “relatively normal American human life,” “crystals in our brains,” and my own observation “is anything really lost?” We went to Blue Springs, where again I had to plunge into cold water. We got rained out at the Bandshell, missing the Steve Miller Band and Doobie Brothers cover bands. I went to a pool party at my uncle’s girlfriend’s house. Again I listened to Betty Guadagno’s story on Next Level Soul podcast, because I find it so uplifting and interesting. I bought myself a teddy bear. We’ve taken even more trips to BJs to buy Aspire, the energy drink John is hooked on, and I am fond of now, too. I pulled an all-nighter working on a blog post, and I don’t regret it. At night I’ve been listening to Coast to Coast AM, a late-night radio program about the supernatural, paranormal, and strange phenomena. I found a peacock feather in the road by our house...

 Today John and I took care of the bamboo. It’s getting big and unruly. It’s one of the unique things about our trailer: there’s a bamboo jungle out front. Years ago (before I moved in) John planted a modest stalk. Years later it would mother a multitude of stalks, now thick and green. You could say it exploded. John loves bamboo. And I read online that snakes do not like bamboo, so that’s good.  Before I got in the shower this morning, John said to me “when you get out, put on your work clothes.” I said “wood clothes?” He repeated “ work clothes. ” So I put on my paint-stained khakis and a sleeveless t shirt. John wore carpenter jeans and sandals and carried the Milwaukee radio outside. He trimmed the branches and I took care of the leaves and weeds (just basic yard work). I collected all the Norfolk pine needles into a bucket. John brought over a dolly so I wouldn’t have to carry the buckets to the brush pile, located on the edge of the Elks field. “Try to dump it all in one...

The Boat Bar is a small establishment in Port Orange (some still call it Allendale), Florida. It looks like a boat, hence why it’s called the Boat Bar, or as we say, just The Boat. It has been getting people drunk for a long time, way before I moved here. Longnecks are two dollars (not sure if they still are). I became familiar with it when my old roommate, Tommy, would send me up there for tacos on Tuesday. It’s one of few bars you can smoke in. The tacos were really good and only two dollars each. I’d walk them back to the trailer in a white plastic bag, and we’d pig out in front of the TV (I always got a side of jalapeños). Almost every time I’d go in there I’d mistake the mannequin for a real lady. One guy said “that’s my girlfriend.” Okay. The Boat does not serve liquor (unless you count the Jell-O shots): only beer and wine (and mini fireballs). I have plenty of not-good memories from my bad drinking days: getting there at 7 am, sitting at the wooden bar in dirty clothes chainsmo...

“Watch out for the flying forks!” is a statement I overheard on the dock recently. The dock is a special place. It’s one of three docks in the trailer park, which sits on the Halifax River. They get destroyed during every bad hurricane, but they get rebuilt. John and Earl rebuilt our dock.  It has a picnic table, Christmas lights, and a sign that says “No Stupid People.” Most people drink on the dock. Ray and Jim drink red wine out of water bottles. Franklin and Kathy sip beer. Carol drinks Mike’s Hard. I drink a variety of drinks, just not alcohol. Sometimes Ray brings me a fruity drink in one of his signature water bottles. Ray is responsible for the music, and since he likes KISS (like is an understatement) we hear a lot of KISS, but also a lot of metal and classic rock. It sets the mood. With the moon coming up and a gentle breeze, it’s the perfect place to get tipsy. Just don’t try to go swimming: the water is full of bacteria.  When it’s cold we light a fire, obviously, ...

 A while ago John and I were walking the trash to the dumpster (it’s like our thing) and next to it was an old beautiful buffet someone was getting rid of. I said I liked it and John was like “do you want it?” and I was like “nah” and he was like “ I know you want it” and I said “where am I going to put it?” and finally he said “It doesn’t matter!” (his signature remark), so he wheeled it on a dolly to the trailer (I thought that was too much work for him but he didn’t care). So now it sits on the porch, by the table where I write my blog posts. At first I didn’t know what I was going to put in it, but now it’s full. I started with some little old books I hold near and dear: The Best Poems Ever, The Lilies of the Field, Sonnets from the Portuguese, The Elements of Style. On the top shelf I added three junk journals I made (for months I was junk journaling. It was really fun). On the bottom shelf I put two embroidered pillows from my mother. There’s and owl coffee mug and paper...

 Okay, so I lied when I said I have only one vice. My other vice is coffee (really any caffeine). And yes, as a recovering alcoholic I drink a lot of coffee, even though I don’t attend AA, and now even more than ever. Obviously I’m a coffee in the morning person, and I like it that way. I’ve been doing that since college. I loved filling up a paper cup and carrying it around campus and taking it to class. In my senior art class my professor, Dr Hough, kept a coffee maker in the classroom. One of my classmates reported that his hands would literally shake while he was using the jigsaw in the wood shop; it scared her ( she was sweet, her name was Larissa and she painted sea turtles). I did notice that if I drank it in the evening it would interfere with my sleep, so I’d only indulge if I was staying up late working on a paper. The cafeteria had a giant pump of hazelnut creamer, next to two big urns of Joe. I realize now that stuff was weak compared to the way I like it now. Coming on...

 My mom has been sending me packets of flower seeds in the mail: zinnias, cosmos, morning glories, and sunflowers. I like doing things now that I’m sober, so I planted some seeds in the planter in front of the trailer (time to sow seeds instead of wild oats!). At first I was really good about watering them. But then I started slacking. And if it rains I don’t bother. So I have some plants growing, but no flowers. I’m disappointed.  I did not inherit my grandmothers green thumb. She could grow anything. She loved her roses. She also grew gardenia, angel trumpets, and bougainvillea. I love the smell of gardenia. Angel trumpets are unique in that they bloom at night once in a while. They smell good, too. And orchids are her favorite flower and they are beautiful. I had a couple of them on my porch until they died. When I was a kid my mother had a small garden in front of our trailer. It had zinnias, cosmos, baby’s breath, Shasta daisies, marigolds, California poppies, and morning...

 I have been having an exhilarating time writing these stories for you guys, and I appreciate your readership (you know who you are!). A year ago I couldn’t imagine I would be blogging. I started my writing again in February of this year, with a yellow Mead notebook I bought at the thrift store for 25 cents (kind of like Bryan Adams and his guitar). By May it was full. I called it No Rules: Journal of Recovery and Discovery. That’s where I fleshed out my early blog posts. John let me use his iPad to make posts to my brand new blog, and then in late May I got my own iPad, and I started a journal on it, which took me away from my paper journal, which I felt bad about (I’m a millennial but I’m still a little old school). These days I use both the iPad and a journal, and that’s fun. It’s a “journal of aliveness,” a phrase I got from Mark Nepo.  This version of myself is so different from the hot mess (not to be cliche…okay I’ll be cliche) I used to be. The hot mess girl was not th...

 In October of last year John and I took a trip up North. I visited my family in Virginia and John went to Pittsburgh to see his family. We left at 3 am and travelled up 95 in the muggy dark with a thermos of coffee and a Red Bull. We got the neighbors to watch and feed our cats. A hurricane was coming so we left in literally the nick of time (sorry cats!). I was nervous about driving on 95 but I did just fine; plus I didn’t want John to do all the driving, so I put on my big girl pants. We watched the sun come up as we drove through Georgia. Getting out of Florida is such a breath of fresh air (no offense).  We got to Virginia in the late afternoon, and I felt a definite temperature change; I had to put on long pants. I drove us over the mountain to get to Luray (my hometown) and I forgot how steep and twisty the road is there. But I also forgot how beautiful and green it is (at that point in October the leaves hadn’t quite changed yet. Which is also gorgeous). Driving those ...

 Barbie is the mermaid I made at Gather 2 Grow, a cool arts and crafts shop in Port Orange (it’s by Seabird  Island). Well, I didn’t make her; she’s a wooden pre-fab. But I did paint her, using a paint pour technique, so she’s a marble mixture of pink, light pink, flesh, and orange, kind of like a sunrise or sunset. I was looking up art classes and I found the Gather 2 Grow website with a variety of classes, and as soon as I saw “paint pour” I knew that  that was something I wanted to do, so I signed up and paid the forty dollars. Terri, our instructor, told us to pick three to four colors and layer them in little Dixie cups. Then she put a thick layer of white paint all over our flat wooden cut-outs. Some people had sharks, horses, dog paws, and even round lazy susans. Then she taught us how to pour the paint on top to create cool patterns and designs. You can’t go wrong with paint pour: it will always look cool. A lot of paint can get wasted, though, but you can scoop i...

 I used to have a teddy bear named Beary. I had him since I was sixteen; he was a birthday present from my grandmother, delivered by the florist along with a bouquet of flowers. I used to put bows on his neck, and one time I played doctor and used him as my patient, IV and everything. I slept with him. I took him to college. Even my ex boyfriend knew about him; he came with me to our apartment and shared the bed. When I would make the bed Beary was the finishing touch. A few years ago I lost him. I’m not sure if I threw him away in one of my drunken rampages, but I probably did (there’s always a price to pay). I loved Beary, even though he was an inanimate object, he brought me comfort.  I know a grown woman shouldn’t have a bear, but I don’t care. I just bought a new one at Walmart (from the baby aisle. I’m a big baby) and he’s going to sleep in the bed with me. What will I name him? I don’t know, probably Beary. I might bring him on our trips, but I know John would think tha...

 Hey guys, I know I write about smoking a lot in my posts, and I hope it doesn’t come off in bad taste. However, I’m not apologizing for “triggering” anybody (so over that). A little history: I didn’t start smoking until I was 28 (and I’m 32), when I was going through a bad time in my life…basically a nervous breakdown (that’s no excuse. But that’s my excuse!). My dad smokes and i asked him for a cigarette. I just wanted to try it. You could say it was a bad idea, but it was my idea (or the devil, according to my grandmother). Anxiety and depression is no good. Let me say, nicotine is pleasurable and powerful. So don’t even try it. If you smoke, you know what I mean. But I was instantly hooked. It did something to my brain, my already whacked out brain, that I had been flooding with THC and alcohol. It was different. It was stimulating (of course. Come on drug people, know your drugs!). I was bumming them off my dad until he made me get my own packs. Then a couple months later I wa...

 I don’t talk about the Argentine side of my family, but my paternal grandparents are from Buenos Aires, Argentina. Can you really consider yourself “Argentine?” (I like to). I’m talking about blood. It’s like America; the people there are from everywhere. But generally if you’re from there that’s what you are. My grandmother comes from an Italian family of ten children (seven girls! and three boys). My grandfathers parents were Danish from Denmark. Argentina has a unique culture. They love the tango, they eat milanessa, and they drink mate. Do you like Messi? He’s from there! Of course you knew that. And they speak Spanish, if you didn’t know. That’s why when i was a little kid I thought my grandparents were from Spain because they spoke Spanish, silly me. But there is a lot of Spanish influence in Argentina, and more generally a European influence. My grandmother has  always told me she speaks Castallano Spanish, which is a more pure, refined form of the language, as disting...

 Today John and I walked the trail at Smyrna Dunes Park (I’ve written about it before), with the main goal of seeing the beach in a commotion, as Hurricane Erin passes by. We saw two gopher tortoises before we even got to the beach. When we got to the steps we sat down to take a cigarette break and a surfer guy walked up to us and said “You guys want to see a baby sea turtle?” He did indeed have a baby sea turtle, and it was dead. It was black and small and fit in the palm of his hand. In fact, from what we could see, all of the protected turtle nests were under water (the ocean was in rare form), and John actually moved some of the protective mesh off the beach so it wouldn’t get carried out to sea. “There is no beach!” John commented. There was water, lots of it, and John was itching to get in it, so I held his shirt and shoes in my backpack so he could cleanse his spirit (and also his cigarettes, lighter, knife, wallet, and keys. I love backpacks). We walked through the plasma t...

 My papu, Enrique Clausen, was born to Danish parents in Argentina in 1933. As a kid he worked in a bicycle shop. He trained to become a diesel mechanic and built his very first car, a model T. He worked with his father in the mountains of Peru building roads. At eighteen he went into the army. When he got out he re-met my grandmother, Beatriz Vignali (they used to roller skate as teenagers), and dated her until they got married. My grandmother wanted a big church wedding, but they settled for a ceremony at city hall. She wore a pink dress. They came to America in the 1950s. I always remember my papu telling me how happy he was when he got off the plane and they shook his hand and said “Welcome to America!” Speaking very little English, he went looking for a job in Baltimore and got hired by Gravely Tractors. He worked there for a long time until he opened up his own bicycle shop in Randallstown, Maryland. My grandparents had three boys: Ronald, my father, and my two uncles, Mauric...

 I read an article by psychic Sheryl Wagner that suggested I try an exercise where I communicate with my spirit guides. She basically said to find a quiet place (my porch), quiet your mind, take some deep breaths, and be open to whatever comes in, and then journal about the experience (perfect). The following is a description. The spirit guides are in quotation marks. I got the 2112 Overture ( a 20 minute song by Rush). “Oh she’s doing that thing again…” (Smoking?) “Ooh it makes me wanna cry” Hey, Girls Just Wanna Have Fun Color blue, corner of my eye The blue dot! They’re just sending out music They’re real funny. “Oh, you think we’re funny!” “Stop punctuating!” Pain in my toe. Pinching my toe? They think I smoke too much. I do too. “We don’t care about your smoking.” What! Oh now I get it…like I have time to listen to a twenty minute song! You guys are funny. I’m slow. “Be a Writer.” I want to be a Liver! “But you fucked up your liver.” “So now you write.” Omg the song’s still pl...

  If you read the title of this, you probably know what it’s about. We were walking the trail at Smyrna Dunes Park. We walked up the observation deck. And there was a cute frog, hanging on the mesh . Wow, what are you doing up here, buddy? Well, I soon found out. As I gazed the horizon for any gopher tortoises, I looked back and there was a snake curling through the mesh. “Mira, Mira, Mira!” I said to John. I don’t know why I suddenly started to speak in Spanish (I got the English scared out of me. And the shit.) So, I’m stuck there, because to get down the steps I’d have to go by the snake, and I don’t trust it, even though it was really only after the frog (Poor frog). So John is looking at it like it’s so cool, and I’m scrambling for an escape. I hurled myself on the railing, and I know John is thinking just calm down. The snake starts to swirl under the steps, so I think it is time to make an escape. When his tail is out of sight I run down the steps, so thankful I didn’t fall...