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WHITE. TRASH. PEACOCK. HATER.
But, before visiting the happiest place on Earth, we had to visit the least happiest places on Earth: my grandparents trailer home in Florida. Paint yourself a mental image:
You pull up to a trailer home an an acre of land in hot, humid Florida. There’s a dilapidated shed, and a satellite dish the size of a car. The land is covered in fire ant hills. You have to watch your every step to avoid crawling, biting, motherfucking fire ants. There’s a stream in the back, it’s murky and you’re not supposed to get too close because there could be alligators. And the peacocks, of course. Those damn peacocks.
You’ve been in the car eighteen hours, with only a couple stops to eat or use a restroom. You’re tired and restless at the same time, and you’re starving. You greet your grandparents with uneasiness. Sure, they’re your grandparents, but you don’t see them too often, and you’ve heard the stories of your grandfather beating the crap out of all six of his children. You’re hungry, but your granparent’s have nothing to eat. Pop-pop has Andy’s candies, but your Grandma warns you not to eat them. They’re Pop-pops. You oblige. Partly from fear. Partly from hope. Hope that after one night’s stay, you’ll be in the condo and going to Disney World. It’s not so bad. You tell yourself. It’s one night.
My parents come from two totally different universes. My Dad’s father is a devout Catholic. He is so religious, that during my sisters communion party, the Priest fled at the sight of him because he didn’t want a lecture from my grandfather.
“Most people go to hell from sins of the flesh.” – Grandpa Palminteri
Pop-pop, my Mom’s father, told me a joke with “and then he fucked her,” as the punch line before I knew what that even meant. The highlight of visiting Pop-pop’s trailer home, was riding on his tractor lawn mower. Yup, we rode a lawn mower for fun. Other things we did for fun: poked fire ant hills with a stick, then ran away when the fire ants poured out, picked oranges off the trees and threw them into the stream to see if there were alligators, and watched John Wayne Westerns with my Pop-pop, in silence, because we feared him.
My grandparents used to own a camper in addition to their trailer home. The last time we stayed there, my brother shared the spare room in the trailer home with my parents. My sister and I stayed in the camper. I was in middle school, and my sister was a freshman in High School.
Even though it was hot in the day, the temperature dropped at night and I remember being cold. My sister and I talked about Disney World. It had been three years since we’d been there last, and we reminisced about our favorite rides, trying to keep our minds off our current situation, neither of us admitting that we were a little bit scared.
Then, we hear stomping on the the camper. Something or someone was on top of the camper. We fell silent in fear. Do we scream? Do we run to the trailer home? Pop-pop had enough guns for all of us to take on a horde of zombies. Then came a horrible scream. An unearthly scream. Like the cross between a cat slowly being run over and a new born baby. But we knew this cry. It was the peacocks. Those motherfucking peacocks and their awful war cry. They were ones stomping all over the camper.
Once we realized it was the peacocks, we laughed. We were still scared, but we figured we were safest if we just stayed in the camper. It felt like we were in a Jurassic Park movie, prisoners of the camper by the large birds.
It’s sad to say, but it’s true… the best part about visiting my grandparents in Florida was leaving. Leaving the harsh reality of our white trash roots, and the reinforcing of the stories of my mother’s perturbing upbringing.
Maybe they did it on purpose, but after spending one night at the trailer of my grandparents, spending a week on a Disney family vacation made my parents looks like super heroes, or great adventurers. To this day, I’m grateful for having fun parents. And to this day, I really fucking hate peacocks.
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