Excerpt
Opening the door to our doublewide, I expected the fragrant odor of dinner on the stove to settle my raw nerves after the rough day I’d had at work.
I expected to hear the happy voices of my young son and daughter at play as their imaginations ran rampant.
I expected a warm and loving embrace from my wife of twelve years; the woman I’d loved throughout high school and had married upon graduation because my first son was on his way into this world.
I expected to receive the respect of my family for bringing home the bacon week after lousy week despite having to put up with the bastards at the factory who pushed for more out of me when I was already giving all I had.
Stepping into the trailer, my senses were assaulted instead with dank, foul air, a roaring television, toys strewn everywhere so there was nowhere to step, and a dark, empty kitchen which bore no signs of recent occupation.
My wife, again pregnant, this time with our fourth child, lay sleeping on the sofa, snoring softly.
Frozen for several moments on the top step, absorbing this scene of undomesticated bliss, I was dumb-founded—speechless. Obviously the lessons of the past were forgotten.