In 2012, I participated in Memoir Journal’s (In)Visible Memoirs Project, exploring the "invisible stories" of California's Central Valley. I wanted to write about my boarding school experience in the Himalayas of Pakistan, but instead, was encouraged to focus on my direct connection to the Central Valley for inclusion in their anthology, "(In)Visible Memoirs."

There was no one my age to play with in Happy Acres. I'd outgrown Penny, and Billy and Mom didn't like me pestering the neighbors. Most of my neighbors were old. They got hummingbirds drunk on sugar water, pruned rose bushes in their pajamas, and hung laundry out to dry. On Halloween, they pretended they didn't recognize me, but I know they did because they winked and put an extra popcorn ball in my pumpkin. I was the only kid who visited them, and they liked me. Too bad you can't play with old people.

Dad brought home a live crab from the Sea Breeze fish market. I’d never seen a crab up close before, its ginormous claws bound tightly by thick rubber bands. Huddled in the bottom of the bucket, it looked less like a sea monster and more like a sad armored spider, its eyes squinting against the sunlight.

“I got a new record at the TG&Y," said Marilyn. Grown-up, that's what she was. She wore a bra.

On my ninth birthday, a package arrived in the mail. I was in the middle of Spirograph design, changing out a red pen for a green one when Mom opened the sliding glass door.

I wasn't allowed to go to Anita’s house after school. I couldn't tell her why, because I didn't understand myself. What was wrong with Anita's house?

Mom was in the kitchen, crying over an onion. Brother was perched on the trailer steps outside, dropping cap bombs on pill bugs. And I was stuck in the living room, eating dinner.

Every year, the PTA put together the Beardsley Elementary Fall Carnival. On the morning of the big day, kids gathered around the basketball courts, excited to see everything coming together. Instead of playing tetherball or hopscotch at recess, they watched as parents set up tables with bright butcher paper skirts and painted banners with tempera paint. Later, a truck arrived with a food trailer, a popcorn machine, and a dunk tank. 

I can’t remember exactly when I got Bunny. He’d been around longer than my baby doll Becky or my six-foot-long, fuzzy purple boa constrictor. I’m pretty sure I got him for Easter.

I saw the Boogeyman. His enormous shadow loomed in my doorway like a thunderhead, yet he never stepped into my bedroom. Each time I encountered him, it was always in the middle of the night when something startled me awake. I'd slowly pull the covers over my head, frozen in my cocoon, hoping that he couldn't see me when I couldn't see him.

Happy Acres Trailer Park was situated behind Robert’s Lane, on a quiet residential street called McCord. My school, Beardsley Elementary, was less than a mile from Happy Acres, so I often rode my bike there. I had a yellow Schwinn girl's bike with a white basket, which made it easier to ride while wearing a dress. On those days, I'd ride the sidewalk along Robert’s Lane, passing the Laundromat, Jolly Cone Drive-In, 7-Eleven, and the rich mobile home community that was protected by a wall.

On Saturday afternoons, if we weren’t at a matinee watching a double feature, Brother and I went rollerskating at Rollerama. Mom dropped us off with enough money for admission and skate rental, but anything else we wanted, we had to buy ourselves.

Happy Acres Trailer Park had two managers. Ed and Marsha were a retired couple who lived in a yellow double-wide right smack between Happy Acres’s entrance and exit. 

Nothing got past them. 

Fatso was a math bully. He hollered the flashcard answer before Anita could open her mouth. 

Photographs and albums were stored in the bottom drawer of Mom's file cabinet. Sometimes, when she felt particularly nostalgic after a martini, she'd invite me to sit beside her on the couch, and we'd browse through her life captured in black and white. Although Mom was an only child, I couldn't help but notice that she had more cousins than she could count, especially when everyone got together for the holidays. I had yet to meet one of them.

On the way to Beardsley Elementary School, I stopped at 7-Eleven on Robert’s Lane to buy some Archie Salt Water Taffy. I’d already spent my weed-picking allowance at Rollerama, so I took a dollar from Mom’s wallet when she wasn’t looking. 

I saw the Boogeyman. His enormous shadow loomed in my doorway like a thunderhead in the distance, yet he never stepped into my bedroom. Each time I encountered him, it was always in the middle of the night when something startled me awake. I'd slowly pull the covers over my head, frozen in my cocoon, hoping that he couldn't see me when I couldn't see him.

I tucked my hair under my daisy-covered swim cap until my scalp stretched so tight my face burned. Mom said I had to wear a rubber swim cap because girl hair clogged pool drains.

Across the street from my trailer, in a small silver Airstream, lived an enormous man named Jerry, his wife, two standard poodles, and a myna bird. They didn't have a chain-link fence around their trailer space like mine, which I considered an open invitation to visit whenever I wanted.

There was a nasty boy who lived in a white double-wide on the east side of Happy Acres Trailer Park. He was obsessed with the radio song “Chick-A-Boom” and wanted to teach me the lyrics so I could sing along.