My Lyrics to Stop the Tired Trailer Trope

[Dear_Prudence]

First time published here at DU! These are lyrics I wrote some 40 years ago as an ode to our trailer park living. We were working our way up to a professional life after years of grad school, so we were still broke. We had decent, hardworking neighbors. The trope of "trailer trash" is tired, classist, and ignorant. Stop it.

ODE TO TRAILERS

They used to call them trailers.
Now they're called mobile homes.
We rent ours from a republican,
But we still call it home.

Chorus:
Some like to fix up a farm house.
Some want to build their own home.
But we're saving up for a double-wide
Deluxe mobile home of our own.

We've got wheels in case we travel.
There's a steering wheel over the sink.
We'll never be featured in Homes and Gardens,
But we don't care what they think.

You can hear the wind on the tin roof
Feel the wind as the trailer sways.
Your house may be built on a firm foundation,
But our house can roll away.

[nolabear]

1. Well done. I grew up in part in a trailer.

The people around me were either military or working class or temporary. We were pretty much all three. No trash in the bunch. In truth I hate trailers these days but not because they’re “trashy.” They just call up some rough, hardscrabble memories.

[Dear_Prudence]

2. No trailer

I never hated trailers, but tough times can leave their mark.

[Hekate]

3. Nice! My own folks started out in a trailer park as stony-broke newlyweds after WW II...

But the first place I remember was a little 2BR 1BA home they bought in a new post-war tract. It had a big backyard with a climbing tree in it.

As for trailers and trailer parks, I personally look on them as affordable housing. I know quite a few middle-aged to retired women who’ve sought them out in our beautiful but oh-so-expensive region, including at least two who were leased or given land to hook up their little house on wheels outside the suburbs.

NB to the DU community: we have DUers who live in trailer parks as well.

[Dear_Prudence]

4. The original tiny homes

Affordable housing. Privacy. And the shows on TV now about the "new" concept of Tiny Homes; mobile homes made innovative, practical use of limited space way back when. So, tiny home? Been there, done that.

[Easterncedar]

5. Right on

We as Dems should be above that.