DAY 8


We had a good night at the Twin Lakes Resort, it was quite and cool, and now we were ready to pack up our rig and get rolling. Sharon and I were sitting outside on a picnic table watching some geese on the pond when Sharon pointed out a lady in a RV spot abut fifty yards away. She too was sitting on a picnic table watching the geese, but she was talking to herself and rocking back and forth, which is unusual even for RV’rs. We watched her for a while, wondering what her life was like.
This was all interesting enough, but we had to get ready to go. Sharon went in to clean up the inside of the trailer while I started to raise the rear struts and disconnect the utilities on the outside. When I was finished I sat back down on the picnic table for a moment. Before long, I heard a banging noise coming from the direction of the detached lady. I glanced over and saw that she was trying to close the door of an old pickup truck. She would slam the door and it would spring back open. She would mutter some choice words and then slam the door again. After about five tries, she just jumped up into the truck and sat there, muttering to herself. She cursed at the truck and then yelled “Come on Bill” to someone inside a nearby mobile home. Before long a couple came out of a mobile home, talked to her for a few minutes and then hopped into a red Toyota and drove off. After a few more swearing tirades aimed at Bill, I formed a scenario of what her situation might be like;

“Come on Bill; get your lazy butt out here”. What a mess this all turned out to be. Stuck out here in the middle of nowhere; sweating out the 120 degree days here in this dump of a ten foot trailer, with absolutely no one around and nothing to do. This sure wasn’t in my plans. When we got married, I thought I was in love. Bill had swept me off my feet. We left that dump of a town I had lived in all my life and headed to Vegas to get married, entirely against my mother’s wishes, but I never listened to her anyway.

Vegas was great for us. Bill got a job as a janitor in the Lady Luck Casino and I waited tables. Life was good until Bill started to gambling. It wasn’t much at first, but before long he was betting his entire paycheck, and loosing. We pawned our car and whatever other belongings we had. Then Bill broke his leg. He couldn’t work and I had to take care of him. I lost my job and we had to move in with Bill’s brother Gray here in Twin Lakes. Actually we moved into an old trailer Gray had on his property. A dump of a ten foot trailer out in the middle of the Mohave Desert; no air conditioning, up on blocks, and just a step above a pig sty. And Bill’s no help. “What do you expect me to do; can’t you see I’ve got a broken leg?” he would cry. Not that it mattered; he had never helped out around the house anyway.

“Bill, get out here, I want to get out of this dump!” she yelled. Gray and his wife were nice enough, but during the day they’re off to work; and with them gone there’s nothing to do around this place; day or night. Crap, if I had half a brain I would go over and hook up with that old man over there and hitch a ride to Vegas. “Bill, where in the hell are you” she yelled as she jumped out of the truck, slamming the truck door which just bounced back open again. She stomped over to the mobile home cursing at Bill all the way. Finally Bill showed himself at the door. “Stop your bitching I can hear ya” he yelled at her, “ He hobbled down the stairs on his crutches and they argued for a while. Then they both went into the mobile home, yelling at each other all the way.

This was all too weird for me. I walked around to the door of our 5th wheel and told Sharon that I loved her. Then we packed up the dogs, got into the truck, and started off for our next destination; Needles, CA.