Jake was our neighbour at the trailer park. Yes, we lived in the trailer park for about 6 years. It was comical when clients would talk about ‘trailer park trash’, and then were carefully advised their valued stylist lived in said housing.
Jake lived there when. lived in, a sweet old man, a lonely old man,
He and his dog Charlie, and they were quite the pair. I was so broke, I didn’t have a phone, and he was gracious enough to let me use his whenever I needed.
Jake had kids, I knew he did. But no-one ever visited Jake. literally never.
One of his kids was an assistant coach with my dad for hockey, and they were the most requested coaching team for the sport locally. (Dad was the only hockey coach in Lincoln County that couldn’t skate, he’d wear those big god awful Kamik boots with the liners and stand centre ice coaching the team. They. always got to the championships, and he always believed in fair play, even the weakest member of the team needed to score a goal by the end of the year, and it was a team effort for everyone to succeed.
Jake also had a daughter I knew about from church. She was adopted, and I only knew her through seeing her on Sundays.
When I went into Jakes house one day to use the phone I was absolutely shocked. The mess was everywhere.
The newspapers delivered weekly were never picked up, they had made a wall on the outside deck that prevented the door from opening fully, and the inside was something to behold. I had never seen mess like that. Used the phone quickly and left. Jake told me he never locked his door, so even if he wasn’t home, I was welcome to go in and use the phone.
One day, he came over early in the morning, reading of whiskey. It was 10 am. He was burping, noticeably drunk, and invited my children to go with him the horse barn that he was working at. I gracefully declined.
Recycling day was very telltale. 2 litre ginger ale bottles, overflowing from the bins, and whiskey bottles so big they had the built in handles. This guy had a problem. He was never an angry drunk, but he did explain to me how he had ended up alone,
You see, Jake didn’t always live by himself. He was happily married with a family at one time.
Jake had a son who went to fight in the Gulf War, and he didn’t come home. There were photos of his son everywhere. He had told me that it hit him so hard, he started drinking because he couldn’t cope, and that led to the demise of his marriage.
It also led to the alienation of his family, there were no birthday visits, no Christmas invitations. It was him and Charlie. Eventually another dog joined the pack, I just can’t remember their name.
There were many many nights that you could see the tv on in Jakes room at the back of his home, the entire room was light up and the lights were dancing.
What we didn’t know at the time was he would be on the floor of that bedroom, passed out from drinking too much.
It was one random Sunday, and his smoke param went off in his trailer, Neighbours on wither side came out, and we could see no flames. We let it go for about 20 minutes, and still , really nothing was happening. I knew the door wasn’t locked, and Jake wasn’t home, so I went in.
The smoke alarm was directly above his stove in the kitchen. Jake had gone out for the afternoon, and forgotten that he was cooking something on the stove. It was smoking but had not caught fire, so I shut it off, and when he came home at the end of the day, I went over to let him know what had happened. He seemed quite embarrassed, but was thankful that I had attended to it. I started watching a little more carefully now, as our homes were fairly close together, and of course, didn’t want anything to happen.
The final straw was a big one, I. had to call Public Health to do a welfare check. Jake was still up and about, moving around, driving here and there, but there were marks on his arms. Weird ones. I didn’t ask, I kind of wanted to watch from a distance. One night however, we found remnants of rodent waste under the kitchen sink. If you ve never lived in a mobile home, the under carriage of the unit is a welcome ground for rodents, with easy access to the interior of the home, by simply shimmying up the pipes. we often had frozen pipes.in the winter, as it was difficult to heat them, and more than once I had to go to work early to grab a shower in the spa, as all of my pipes were frozen. No coffee, no shower, no nothing. Leave one tap open a bit and by evening when you returned home, it was back on…
But things were happening next door as well. I noticed (and it sounds so gross to say what I’m about to say, but I didn’t and hadn’t ever dealt with this before) but I could see rodents, in the daytime, in Jake’s window frames, inside. His windows were crank windows, they had no real frame around the window that they could rest in, they were active.
And they were coming into my house. My microwave cord had been chewed, and there was evidence of them under the sink. They had fair reign of the kitchen at night. I would lock my bedroom door, with my kids in my room, to be as far away from them as possible. At the time, I could not afford to have pest control in, so I did the best I could. Poison everywhere under the trailer, under the sink, and anywhere else I could. Steel wool in all the holes that they could sneak into.
I called the health board to check Jake’s house after I saw the rodents in the window. It ws Easter weekend, and they connected with me on the Friday, but said they could not come. until after the long weekend.
in the meantime, Barbara, the nosey Parker stylist at my first salon, unknown to me had contacted Family and Children’s services, to report my living conditions, stating her ‘concern’ for my children.
They dropped letters in the mailbox that only half flyers, and I went to work every day, not knowing they were trying to contact me, By the tie I found out, it was a warning letter that stated my children would be removed from the home if I didn’t contact them.
When I went to work and told the staff what was happening, busy body Barbara admitted it was her. It was her last day anyway, so what did she care?
FACS required the children to be there in person, so I had to pull my oldest out of school. The agent walked in the house, and within 5 minutes had left, outright stating she had zero need to have paid a visit. My house was clean, my children in good condition, I wish Barbara could have been charged with filing a false claim. As it was, the salon she went to open to do better than the salon I was at failed within 3 years, and she lost her home and marriage. Karma Barbara, karma.
Public Health came, and knocked on the door, but Jake wasn’t home.
Pete, who lived on the other side of Jake, came out to talk to him, wanted to find out what he was looking for.
“Received report of rodent infestation, but cant’ see anything here’.
Pete invited him into his house, said wait until the dogs stop barking… you ‘ll see for yourself.
As the dogs quieted, The agent was dumbfounded. Rodents, full size rats, came out from under his trailer, and were playing in the grass. His only comment to Pete was…’if they’re playing outside in the daytime, there’s so many underneath there’s not room for them all.
What had been happening, was that Jake hadn’t thrown out garbage in years. H?e only ate take out dinners, and when he passed out on the floor of his room, the rats would come and finish off the food in the container. They also started nipping away at him, He was unconscious, and ut up no fight.
Things moved quite quickly after that. His family came one time only, with the manager of a clean up crew, to attempt to organize a massive horde clean. The agreement was: If we see one rodent, we’re out. They walked in with full body hazmat suits, and were gone one hour later. Rodents were everywhere. Jake had to be removed from the home. He had to surrender his dogs to the humane society.
In all, 88 bags of garbage were removed from the home. The home was about 700 sq ft. Furniture, dishes, everything went. I’d see Jake sneak in late at night, sleep there, and sneak out by 6 am so he wouldn’t get caught. I don’t know that they supplied housing for him, or simply told him he couldn’t come back…
The home ended up adding another trailer, and becoming a double wide, housing a single mom and her two kids.
I’ve just checked for an obituary for him, and it mentions his son Kevin passing in 1994. It also show how little he meant to his family. It mimics the obit that pathetically remembered my father. No picture for Jake though. He died at Deer Park Villa on March 17, 2013 aged 81. He was remembered with more compassion from his friends at the residence, than his family, who cremated him with no service, and lay him to rest at a later date, likely in an unmarked grave. His obit was barely a paragraph.
Its amazing how people can do so much for others, and mean so little to their families.
Rest easy, Jake. I hope Charlie was there to meet you.