I Essay #2 Draft----NOT FINISHED AT ALLLLL

It smelled like moth balls and old people. Some people may say those smells are one in the same, but my experience had lead me to be able to distinguish between the two. It was white, or it used to be, and there was a screen porch hanging by a thread off the front steps. We ate macaroni and cheese, hot dogs, and iced tea mixed with orange juice off of paper plates on the patio furniture encrusted with dirt in all the cracks. That iced tea was legendary. I still believe to this day my Grandma invented mixing iced tea and orange juice. The tangy citrus of the orange meshed perfectly with the strong mellowness of the teabags. Some summers I would come here with my sister and my cousin with the see through skin. My parents would shake us awake really early in the morning to roll out of bed and into the Pontiac for the drive to the trailer park. I would usually fall asleep in the car, but from the times my eyes wouldn’t shut I remember the drive. We drove down long stretches of highway where the mile markers crept along in a pattern. Deer occasionally leaped alongside the road, and I always caught my breath when they came too close. My sister Taylor snored, and my cousin Mary drooled. My parents listened to hair bands and sang in harmony for the entire two hour drive, (they still do that).

As we approached the entrance to the trailer park, it reeked of cliché. We pulled in and the pavement turned to gravel. There was an eerie playground to the left that looked haunted, surrounded by a wooden fence with only two rungs. Tents were scattered around the perimeter of the vicinity, and the smell of burning firewood filled my lungs. We made the first right after the ice cream store and the bingo hall. Taylor would stretch her arms in the air, moaning loudly to emphasize how tired she was. Mary never made a sound.

Our bright red Pontiac pulled in right behind my Papa’s picture perfect white ford. My family and I poured out of the car sleepily like syrup. Papa was sleeping on the porch in a recliner clearly made for indoors. My grandma was inside straightening her narrow bed and placing her Yankees teddy bear on her pillow. I ran inside in front of everyone eager to give my grandma a hug, well, and also claim my spot on the pull-out couch us three kids would be sharing. Grandma always had a pitcher of her famous and my favorite iced tea sitting on the counter when she knew we were coming. My parents helped us get settled in, and then they left.
Papa woke up after hearing all the commotion that three children under the age of twelve make. His knowing eyes smiled at us and hugged us, saying, “good girl”, in our ears as he always did. Dinner that night was grilled cheese and tomato soup, and of course, iced tea filled to the brim of our flowered glasses that Grandma knew we loved. We didn’t talk much. Grandma asked us how school was, and what sports we played. Papa never said much, he just smiled and nodded, listening intently while scooping that tomato soup in his wrinkly mouth. I told Grandma that I loved swimming but I didn’t make the blue team that year. Taylor said the same, and Mary wasn’t allowed to play sports, I think. After dinner which Papa cleaned up, we clamored into the squeaky pull-out couch turned bed for three. We barely fit. Only if we laid head to toe could we squish and not fall off in the middle of the night; which often happened anyway. Taylor, Mary and I giggled all night long as Grandma and Papa snored in their separate beds across the tiny hallway from each other.

We always played “house”. Grandma and Papa would sit on the front porch reading the newspaper, and us kids pretended the trailer was a mansion, and that it was ours. I always wanted to be Grandma. I tried to replicate the iced tea to put on the counter for my favorite grandchildren but I always either put too much tea or too much orange juice. Mary and Taylor were my grandchildren and they sat patiently for their pretend eggs and bacon every morning.

When I was twelve I was allowed to walk with Mary and Taylor down to the playground by ourselves. It was a big deal because it was down the road and to the left, and by the entrance to the trailer park. We flirted with boys and pretended we were runaways from home. We tried to swing all the way over the metal bar on top of the swing set, but never did. We pretended to have English accents, and sometimes the other kids even believed us. One time we spun around so much we threw up, but I didn’t tell Grandma.

One night when we came home from the playground, there was a Yankee game playing on the eight by eight inch television. Grandma and Papa never missed a game, no matter who was visiting. Taylor, Mary and I found spots on the floor at their feet to cheer for our beloved Yankees. Everytime Derek Jeter came up to bat, Grandma would reach her arms towards the television, wiggling her fingers saying, “I’m giving him the heebie jeebies for good luck!” We drank iced tea pitcher after pitcher and wiggled our fingers at the television whenever Jeter was up.