Kristi Carl
Intimate Journalism
Dr. Bob-O
7/13/2000
Taking Out the White Trash
It was a particularly hot Saturday evening in early July. My boyfriend’s ’94 Buick Century hugged the corners of the twisting four lane road that barreled through the rolling landscape of the Texas Hill Country. City-dwellers might consider this area to be the "back-woods." Still, this place is familiar to me. Here, cedar trees and scorpions rule. This is a place where the purple haze of city lights do not smother the starry skies, and where perhaps people talk a little slower. For the past eight years of my life, I have lived in a small town neighboring our vehicle’s destination. Placed awkwardly between the ever-growing suburbs of Austin and the welcoming waters of Lake Travis sits one, little- known town. * Don’t blink. Welcome to Jonestown, population unremarkable. *
There is one main road that runs through Jonestown. Here you will see two gas stations, one restaurant, and a handful of other small buildings. The local auto-body shop has been abandoned, leaving only a faded sign and a few old tires as proof to its existence. There are no traffic lights. In fact, the only lights in the whole town come from a small wooden shack placed conveniently off the main road. Here lies the Lonestar Bar.
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The brakes on the Buick begin to grind as we descend into downtown Jonestown. I can feel the tiny hairs on the back of my neck begin to rise. The hard, gnashing lump in my stomach has been growing ever since we began our journey. Neither swallowing, nor chain-smoking can ease my fear. As we pull into the bar’s parking lot, I want to run. I have heard too much about this place. The Lonestar Bar has a reputation–a reputation unwelcoming to four college kids.* Nevertheless, I along with my three purposefully chosen accomplices exit the vehicle. Despite having three men, each weighing nearly three hundred pounds, at my side, I know to watch my back closely. In normal situations, my college football-playing friends are as good as life insurance, yet as Dorothy might say, "we are not in Kansas anymore."
The frivolously strewn Christmas lights, which hung from the cement- surrounded tree in the parking lot, were surreal. Shards of colorful light reflected off the windshield of a broken down pick-up. To my left, three motorcycles were crammed into one handicapped space. On the door, I failed to see a welcome sign. It is a well-known fact to locals that you do not enter this place if you still posses a full set of teeth.
It was a scene out of an old Western flick. The bad-guy walks into the bar and everything stops. It is a time when the absence of sound is not quiet at all. That was us. The radio stopped, and immediately we were confronted with about thirty of the ugliest faces imaginable. I turned right back around, hoping to end this nightmare. I was more than willing to erase myself from this place. * Instead, my boyfriend grabbed me and directed me toward the only uninhabited table in the place. This table happened to be directly in the center of the bar. We took our seats and waited.
"This place is full of white trash!" Caleb spouted under his breath. "Shut Up!" I exclaimed, "you don’t say THAT word in here." The guys laughed. I sweated. While the boys- my friends- were having a grand ol’ time joking with each other, my paranoia was escalating beyond sane capability. "Just relax Kristi," my boyfriend advised. "Why did I fucking choose this topic?" I thought to myself. "No white trash person is going to talk to me for my little college paper, I’m a fucking idiot!"
Amidst my moment of self-induced verbal abuse, three Lone Star Beers landed on the table. Why only three? Did they forget to order one for me? I looked up. Standing across the table was a woman, probably in her late thirties, smiling at my boyfriend. She had her hand raised beckoning to him. "Those beers aren’t free boys!", she yelled followed by a god-awful cackle. This woman proceeded to inform my boyfriend along with Caleb and Sean that they were needed on the dance floor. I sat in my seat quietly. In hindsight, watching Grant, Caleb, and Sean dance with this mysterious white-trash lady was quite humorous, but I was not in a welcoming state-of-mind.
Webster’s Dictionary defines white trash as, "n. Disparaging. 1. A member of the class of poor whites, esp. in the Southern U.S. 2. Poor whites collectively(W)." I certainly hit the jackpot. Melinda was in fact white trash according to Webster, and according to me. This woman who hit on my boyfriend for two hours without even acknowledging my presence had to be a member of our society’s lowest class. Nevertheless, I had to at least be grateful that she granted me this interview. In my final hour at the Lonestar Bar, Melinda sat down to talk to me. I told her about my reason for coming to the bar: I needed to interview a stranger for my final journalism paper. I told her that I thought she had a good sense of humor, and I would greatly appreciate her story. I was ordered to meet her at her home a few days later. "Don’t forget the case of Lone Star", she firmly reminded me. "Believe me, I won’t" I thought to myself. I did not tell her that my paper was about white trash.
The daytime light which shone through my car windows did not make Jonestown any less scary. As I drove my Lexus SUV down the tangled maze of dirt roads towards Melinda’s house, that wrenching pain in my gut reappeared. Being a person who is overly conscious about the car I drive, I knew that my foreign luxury automobile did not belong on these roads. Ever since I bought this car two years ago, I have had trouble passing other, less expensive cars on the road. More often than not, these cars are driven by my elders-- people whom I address as "sir," or "ma’am." * These are people who work hard for their money. I can feel their resentment towards me. They do not know why I drive this car, but assumptions are made: I am a spoiled rich girl, living off of Daddy's money.
Finally, I arrive at Melinda’s home. It is a trailer, a double wide. The color scheme on the exterior of the house is white, with pea-green trim. Beneath the wooden steps leading to the doorway lay an array of children’s toys. A baby-doll with black tasseled hair is positioned under the wheel of a discarded stroller. I decide to park below the shade of a distant cedar tree. "Why’d you park so far away?" Melinda calls as she lets the front door slam behind her. "Oh, I just wanted to park in the shade" I lie. I hurriedly grab the promised case of Lone Star and walk towards her. It is too late, she has seen my car. "A Lexus eh? I wish I had a car like that." "That car probably costs more than my house." I do not know how to respond. I hate situations like this. I hold up the case of cold beer hoping to sidetrack the conversation. "Good–you remembered," Melinda smiles. "So have you ever been in a trailer, or are you too good," Melinda jokes? "Yes, my Dad used to have a trailer" I rebuttal. The stark contrast in our social statuses has brought tension to air. Melinda perceives me as something I am not. I am aware that this interview will go nowhere if this perception is not destroyed. I tell her a condensed version of my story.
"When I was thirteen I was put in a mental institution. I did not belong in that place, but the doctors kept me there so that they could get my insurance money. Don’t worry, I am not crazy. The doctors there were bad. I was young, I didn’t know what they were doing was wrong. I did not know my rights, or who to trust. They hurt me. They did terrible things to me in that place. Anyhow, one day my insurance man visited the hospital. They found out how I was treated. It was against the law what they were doing. I was there for a year before they found me. My Dad took me home, and called a lawyer. We sued the hospital, the doctors, everyone involved. That’s how I have money. I wasn’t born this way. I grew up kind of poor actually. Now my parents spoil me, hoping that it will take away my nightmares."
The beers are flowing. Melinda has now warmed-up to me. I now feel comfortable in her home. I sink deeply into her oversized couch. Her trailer is tidy. The scent of cigarettes hangs strongly in the air. "You smoke Camels, too?" Melinda questions with a smile. "Yep," I reply. "Maybe we’re not that different," she adds.
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The term white trash is used often in the town I live in. During high school there was a stark difference between social classes. The trailer parks are dotted along one side of the lake, while the larger homes with lush lawns can be found on the opposite side of the lake. Those who lived on the greener shores considered people who lived in trailers to be white trash. These type of people had sexual relations with their household pets, and usually married within their family. Their hairstyles were unflattering, and their clothes never fit them properly. These type of people lacked social knowledge.
My definition of white trash differed from my well-off classmates’. I was raised to believe that one earned the title of white trash out of behavior, not monetary worth. If a person were to act in a manner contradictory to my behavioral code, I would label them white trash. Melinda fit my preconceived notions of white trash simply because she hung out in the Lonestar Bar. Being white, it is easy for me to label other white folks. While the word nigger is difficult for me even to write, I have no problem saying, "white trash." Ironically, I feel both words have the same meaning. Yet, I do not dare spout that word at someone of a different skin tone.
"What was your childhood like", I ask Melinda? "Horrible. All the kids at school made fun of me. I grew up in a small town in Idaho. We lived in a beat-up old house. There were mice all over the place. One time my sister rolled over and squashed a mouse to death while she was sleeping. When she woke up there was a flattened mouse under her. I mostly got hand-me-downs, even my underwear. Kids didn’t like you unless you wore name-brand clothes. That’s why I hate rich people today. I still have a lot of resentment about my school days."
Melinda just turned thirty a few months ago, but she looks much older. Her hair is almost completely gray, and her skin is badly wrinkled. She has two children. Her son, Deakin is fifteen, and her daughter Mary is eight. Both children were born out-of-wedlock, and both have different fathers who never see them. "Neither of the kids Daddy’s stayed around, so now I work two jobs trying to make their lives better. I know their childhood is better than mine was, even though I had a Daddy. I was fourteen when I got pregnant with Deakin," she says. " It was my first time to have sex, I didn’t know about protection. It was quite a shock when my belly started growing. I didn’t believe I was pregnant. I kept thinking if I didn’t admit it, it would go away. I never went to the doctor. Nine months later I started having real bad cramps. I thought I was constipated, so I sat on the toilet and kept pushing. Then Deakin popped out. I had him in the toilet. Isn’t that terrible? I started screaming and my sister came in and found him. There was blood everywhere. They called the ambulance. Luckily Deakin was alright." *
"I use to get in a lot of fights at school. Sometimes I would win, sometimes I would lose. I had a lot of anger. My real Mom died when I was twelve, but it didn’t matter much cause she left the house when I was three. My Dad and Stepmom raised me. Dad went to Vietnam, and now he has lots of flashbacks. He would beat on us kids a lot. Mostly my sister would get the bad beatings, I usually had to eat soap. My Stepmom wasn’t much better. She eats her boogers. When we were little me and my sister Kathy made up a song about her. It goes, ‘pick,pick,eat,eat, that’s the way she likes to be.’ I’m glad I’m down here in Texas now, and they’re still up there in Idaho."
I swallow the last, warm gulp of beer, and ask to use the restroom. I realize that I have been putting my question off for too long. I need to know how Melinda defines white trash. How can I ask this question without offending her? Trying to be an ethical journalist is hard. Still, Melinda deserves my honesty. I lay it all on the table.
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"What do you think of the term white trash," I say, avoiding Melinda’s eyes. To my amazement, she laughs. "Is that what you think of me?" she says with a warm smile. She is not angry, and she is not being defensive. This is my chance. "Honestly, when I first met you, I did ignorantly stereotype you like that," I reluctantly admit. "Do you want to know what I thought of you when I first saw you?" she asked back. "Yes," I say. "I thought you were a preppy snob that didn’t belong at that bar, so I hit on your boyfriend to make you feel bad. I didn’t like you because you look like you’ve had an easy life. A little rich girl with no respect." This time we laugh together, the fear and ignorance no longer separating us.
"Growing up, my family was white trash. It is hard to define a word like that, but whatever the correct definition is, my family was. My dad had old broken down cars in the front yard which he chained our dogs to. Dad even went through this phase where he wanted to do ‘yard art.’ He put a damn toilet in the middle of the yard and filled it with dirt. He was going to plant flowers in it, but he never got around to it. Kids use to ask me if we went to the bathroom in it. It was so embarrassing."
" Also, we had this slutty cat who use to get-it-on whenever the school bus came to pick us up. Right in the yard she would start screaming like she was being killed, and all the kids would laugh at us. I swear that cat would wait until she saw the school bus coming to start doing it."
Today, it seems like the media is obsessed with American white trash. From, Jerry Springer to Married With Children, to WWF, to Kid Rock, even to the recent movie, Erin Brockovich. The list is quite long. Poor, white country folk are no longer being portrayed in a respectable light like they once where in "Little House on the Prairie", or "The Waltons." Instead, media conglomerates which regulate popular culture have found that shock tactics and trash make money. It is these images which may lead to further ignorance and hatred towards the people who live in trailer parks, and can’t afford Tommy Hilwhatever. Does white trash mean poor? Or distasteful? * A clear-cut definition to this word will not come easy.
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"I do not consider myself white trash today. I work hard. I live an honest life. I have my demons, my vices, but I am also human. I am trying to provide a better life for my kids, so hopefully one day they can have more. I do not want them to be judged, like you have judged me. I also do not want them to judge you, like I have."
On Saturday nights Melinda likes to go to the Lonestar Bar. There, she plays pool, talks with friends, and of course, drinks Lone Star Beer. On Saturday nights I go to the country club. There, I play billiards, socialize with peers, and of course, drink White Zinfandel. Our lives are not much different, except that she’s white trash, and I’m a snob. May we forever live with the crooked brands which society has burned into our skin.
AFTER WORD:
After leaving this interview, I stopped at the local gas station in Jonestown, which sits next to the Lonestar Bar. Here, I received a dirty look from a man who pulled in behind me. He drove a beat-up station wagon. I can only imagine why I received that look, but I simply returned his grimace with a smile. Though it is truly painful to be misjudged, I cannot expect this man to understand. Social stigmas run deep and are unforgiving.
I have little left to say, except that my encounter with Melinda has been one of the most enlightening and rewarding experiences of my life.
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