tales from the hood

This was truly amazing. Growing up, we had the mottliest crue of children on our block. And the nicknames, ah, the nicknames, they were nothing short of wonderful. The pure creativity of children cannot be matched. We had Richard and Davy Crockett (real names) from the trailer court, Two Leslie, The amazing Chico, Matt Metal (who drove the dragon wagon) and had a mean mom, Sara and Lonnie (the deliverance kids), Beavis and his sister Action Jackson, Breather, Rampin' Reba, and the Inciminator. But next door to me lived a fabled group of children, the Happy Trash Kids.

The happy trash kids earned the nickname in a not so surprising way. Their father, Elmer, ran a trash collection business and the sign on his garbage truck simply read "Happy Trash" with a smiley face. Happy trash dad parked the garbage trucks behind their home which gave the neighborhood a quite unpleasant odor in the summer and also attracted rodents.

Some people are just doomed from day one. Not only did they have this glamorous nickname, but their parents happened to be Pentacostal.

While the happy trash children did not attend school with us, we occasionally played with them when nobody else was looking. It always had to be in front of their house as they were not allowed to cross the street. There were 4 in all, 3 girls and 1 boy, the girls always awash in Puritan style dresses, the boy in corduroy overalls. He used to pee his pants a lot, so seeing him with a growing dark stain around his crotch was not a real surprise. We spent our days throwing water balloons at them and they spent their's trying to save our souls (many others would attempt this later in life as well). The only conversation I actually remember word for word went a little something like this (I was around 11 or 12):

Happy Trash Girl: I know a place where the streets our paved with gold. Wanna know where it is?

Me: Yeah! (I was genuinely intrigued)

Happy Trash Girl: In heaven!! If you go to church with us we can help you to find your way there.

Me: I have to go inside now.

They attended services several times a week and sang psalms often. Eventually the trash trucks drove away and the happy trash kids moved. The neighborhood rumor was that dear Elmer, the happy trash dad, left the religous life and his wife and went back to boos, but I must note this was never confirmed.