i lived on the bad side of town as a kid. run down houses, low income neighborhoods, scruffy kids, the older adults called it “wrong side of the tracks”.
i grew up in an old house with a pool and spent many white trash summers playing mermaids by myself and my pastel coloured sea ponies from my little pony. i didnt know we were white trash or i guess mixed race trash. my drove a shitty copper coloured van and my mom had lots of gold jewelry and a house with pink carpet.
she would stand at the chipped formica counter top with the 1970s kitchen dinette seating and she would cut up strawberries and mix them with sugar in a big old yellow plastic mixing bowl that was also used for salads and tea for sunburns and vomit if someone was sick.
she would let the strawberries macerate in the old shitty fridge while my skin browned and my hair lightened in the sun. i had an old barbie tshirt and id sit in the fading evening light after swimming myself exhausted and id eat the syrupy strawberries until my mouth and fingers were sticky.
i would listen to my parents laugh and smoke cigarettes. those summers smelled like chlorine and strawberries.
on sunday, i realize my 2lbs of strawberries bought on sale are starting to turn and without a second thought, i cut them up and make my own macerated strawberries. i stand at my own shitty counter in my own shitty house with my gold jewelry from the thrift store and white trash beer logo tshirt and i wonder if this is how we become our mothers.
i share the dessert in the fading light and eat every last spoonful under smoky skies. i would still love to play mermaids. i would still wear that old barbie shirt.
