Our Outing

Dad and I drive down the road to the trailer park. Oh, no! Frank's's car is in his driveway! Surely that can't mean - He is without work again. We are hoping to get rent from him today. Yup...That temp job that promised much has lasted just four days. Although he has very little money left and has pawned many of his items, I take twenty dollars from him....Monthly electric bill has to be paid on Wednesday and we will need it...Hope his job possibility for Wednesday works out. If not, we will have to ask him to leave, which we hate to do, and have tried to avoid. Still,I think the time will have come!

There is John's trailer on the lift...Wonder if he and Nancy are back together. He went into a screaming fit a couple of weeks age, frightening her. She had the boys call Family Services and, when they realized John had a criminal record of pulling a gun on his former wife, they demanded that the children leave the home. Nancy went with them voluntarily...They should all be together again by now, but see no sign of anyone home. Apparently, they are here again, but have been heard arguing loudly. Hope they stay. For all the fireworks, they are basically responsible and have been good tenants.

On to Danny's old trailer to try and clean it into some rentable state. Ooooh. Stuff everywhere and what a smell! I start in the kitchen, pulling out the stove to see what might be there. Nameless, amorphous debris. I pull on gloves and start to pick up the biggest clumps in preparation for vacuuming. Yikes! I have a dead, dessicated mouse by the tail! Disgusting! But actually the place is not as filthy as I thought it might be. Dad and I make good progress putting it to rights. But he will have to do a little construction work before we can rent it out.

Time to go and collect the rent from Peter and Silvia...Peter, did you get your government check back yet?...It was stolen by the daughter of the people who now rent Doug and Ellen's old trailer. It was taken from their mailbox, then the girl attempted to cash it at Walmart - caught on tape. She is now out until trial and, in the meantime, her sister has been arrested with her husband, for breaking and entering....Still, the parents are quiet, orderly, and pay their rent faithfully. Peter now gets all his checks by direct deposit and I hope all will work out...I ask Silvia how her son and his wife, Gail, are doing....I haven't seen them in a while. Gail's son overdosed, was found dead in the woods. They think someone gave him the drug...You mean he was murdered?....Yes...Gail is not doing too well....

Then I get a call from Jane. She and her husband are going away for a week to visit their marine son in Texas. Do I want their rent now or when they return? Now please....Thanks...Her husband is very ill with liver damage from years of drug abuse. They almost couldn't rent the house because he has to live very close to the county where he was arrested for drug dealing. But they have become Christians in recent years and are good tenants and pleasant company. I always enjoy chatting with them.

I go back to Danny's old trailer and begin to clean again....Hello, who are you? Oh, you are the guy who lives in the trailer across from our property. No, we don't want to hire anyone for that. We will do it ourselves....John? So he is the convicted rapist? The one who is in and out of jail all the time?

The others I know and understand, but that last guy really makes me nervous!