Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Straight out the trailer

Trailer Park Pictures, Images and Photos

This story is true. You can choose to believe it or not to, but think about this: truth is almost always stranger than fiction.

I've always said I am a freak magnet. My friends are a wide range of people - this is a good thing; it makes life more interesting. But over the years, I guess because I'm nice to everyone, despite claims of hating people, I've had some serious weirdos come into my life. Usually they don't last long, but long enough to leave a scar on me that remains. This person falls into that category, without a doubt.She is an ex-coworker of mine, and the few other ex-coworkers who read this already probably know exactly who I'm talking about. The nickname she likes to go by is the Princess of Darkness, so for convenience sake and this story, she shall hereby be known as POD.

POD came to work at my ex company a few months after I did. Since I was the human resources person at the time, I was one of the first people to encounter her, having to give new hires their paperwork, show them around, etc. The first thing I noticed about her was her hair. Though the year was 2004, her hair was straight out of 1987. Long, permed with bangs sprayed so high and stiff, they could withstand the hurricane force winds that occasionally blew through Tampa. Her clothes as well were typical 80's workforce chic.

Then she opened her mouth.

Tooth. Missing. Front tooth. Missing.

So, okay. Who am I to judge, right? Though I could pretty much tell her life story just from her appearance alone, I didn't get to confirm it for a few months, since she was very quiet and did not exactly give off the friendliest vibe. It took awhile, but several of us did get friendly with her, though I'm not quite sure why. The people who still continue to try to be nice to her still wonder why. Quite simply, she is the most miserable, pessimistic, nastiest, worst-attituded person I've ever, ever known. Everything sucks. Life, work, family, boyfriend, school, money, the world. Nothing is ever good. Except when she thinks something is funny, something usually twisted or bad, then she will laugh her toothless witchy laugh and that is scarier than her normal mad face. And since I'm funny, yes I said it, and also enjoy a twisted sense of humor every now and again, of course she fell in like with me. Of course she did.

She and her boyfriend Drunky (again, her nickname) (this stuff writes itself) live in a trailer park. Where else would they live? She was so excited upon moving in there a few years back, she threw a house warming (trailer warming?) party, since it was a substantial upgrade from the trailer they were moving out of. And by the way, don't get all over my ass for making fun of trailers - I've lived in one, I've been in plenty that were fine, nice even, so I'm not saying this with any condescending tone. I'm merely setting the scene.

As you can imagine, the party did not go well. Considering she has very few friends, (shocker!)and even fewer friends she's able to guilt into attending something like that (hi, I'm a sucker) I think there were possibly eight or nine people there. We brought all the food (again, sucker), brought her presents for her new home, which wasn't too difficult, considering her decor is Dragons and Darkness - I know it well. After the first hour of eating and talking, there wasn't much to do and my evil friend J.A. (yeah, I still haven't forgiven you for this) bailed quickly, using some made up and horrible excuse, leaving Brian and I virtually stuck with these people, who proceeded to get drunker and drunkeier as the afternoon wore on. I believe we made our escape sometime around six, after Drunky half hit on me and I told Brian: WE'RE DONE HERE.

I found out later, things only went downhill from there, which is the only way things like that can go. Drunky is a mean drunk.Fast-foward to last year. I'm long gone from ex workplace, but I still keep in touch with a lot of the people on a regular basis. I find out POD has finally, finally left Drunky after years of miserable cohabitation and complaining to us every day about how he passed out last night after yelling at her about what was for dinner, after weekends of her studying in her room the whole time because she didn't want to be around him, after getting locked out in the cold, in the rain, etc. Yeah, Drunky was a prince among men. The clincher, what finally made her leave: in a drunken rage, he threw a salt shaker at her head. (Aside: When I told Brian this, he said, "Yeah, but was it full?" He is so evil sometimes).

Since the situation had finally escalated into somewhat abusive territory, she secretly made plans at work, with the help of many co-workers and a loan from her boss and moved out one early Saturday morning while Drunky was at work. Drunky is a milk delivery man, so he's out of the house by 2a.m. or thereabouts. She moved into a house owned by a landlord who rents rooms out specifically to women like her, to help out and give them an affordable place to stay. Most of them show up with nothing but some clothes. I believe POD brought her clothes and massive dvd collection, some school books and that was about it.

So. We all took bets. How long would this last. She was miserable in the relationship, but she's miserable anyway, so it's hard to tell a difference, though people reported to me she was noticeably happier. She still called co-workers a lot on the weekends, complaining about being lonely but not wanting to go out and do anything, I talked to her once (mercifully) because I did want to tell her I was proud of her and sent her a book and a card to try to tell her she's stronger than she thinks she is, she will make it, blah blah. Glad I didn't invest any more than that.

Because you know what I'm about to say.

A few months ago, she went back to the trailer park and Drunky. I estimate she lived on her own for six months, which is actually longer than the more cynical among us gave her.

So here's the story. (FINALLY, right??) (Shut up)

She moves back in, not only with Drunky, but also his brother and a friend. This is a big trailer, so okay. The friend has a girl he works with, down on her luck, nowhere to stay, blah-blah. Drunky tells him she can stay there for awhile. Because you know, the more the merrier at the White Trash Bed and Breakfast (serious bonus points if you get that reference and you're not Grace). The girl moves in. Drunky and the girl start spending time together, since she doesn't have a car and he's the chivalrous sort giving her rides to work and such. POD doesn't think much about it. Until the other day when Drunky tells her: "It's over. I'm in love with Joy." Yes, that's her real name, which is so perfect - picture Joy on My Name is Earl, but I'm sure she doesn't look like Jamie Pressley.

Here's the kicker. POD has nowhere to go. I don't know the specifics here and can only speculate on the conversation, but somehow it's worked out that until she finds another place, she moves into the guest room - WHILE JOY MOVES INTO THE MASTER BEDROOM WITH DRUNKY. I told you, I couldn't make this up if I tried.

Apparently she now does have a place to go, but isn't moving until November 1st. Picture two or three weeks of living in what was previously your domain, with what was previously your boyfriend, watching another woman go into your bedroom at night with him. No, picture ONE NIGHT of that. Could you do it? I gotta give her credit, because not just no, but FUCK NO. You mean to tell me, you, the Queen of the Bad Attitude, the Princess of Darkness, is putting up with this?? Which is actually sad, since that tells you the state of her insecurities and non-belief in herself, in case you hadn't picked up on that already.

It's actually very sad and I shouldn't be making fun of it. Except that it's also so funny. Oh, Princess. May you find happiness this time outside the trailer park.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

She's probably just happy he'll be throwing the salt shaker at someone else's head for a while!

Kidding aside, I hope this was the shove she needed to stay away from Drunky.

I, too, rented a trailer for a few year. It was PINK.

Eesh.

Kim said...

A pink one! I would've made the most of that and gone balls-to-the-wall crazy. Ours was just the garden variety big triple wide, but it was out in the woods on a great piece of property and had a fabulous deck. I actually loved it.

WendyB said...

That is an amazing tale.

Anonymous said...

I seem to remember a SNL skit with a "White Trash Bed and Breakfast"...Patrick Swayze maybe. I am going to check YouTube.

Kim said...

YOU ARE CORRECT SIR!

Whoa, another SNL reference. I'll stop now.

vuvie said...

Man... I can read your blog the whole night. This is tooo toooo tooooooooooo funny!