Pennies-Fun-Heaven!: The Priceless Life of a Trailer Park Shrink

By Dr. Juan Trafton Schmeltanzinger

So, what would you do if a blow to the head ended your marriage, career, and middle class life, andleft youno choice but to retire to a trailer park by the beach next to Mexico, to become a rookie writer on a pittance? "Pennies-Fun-Heaven!" is the answer that turns poverty's grind into a satisfied grin.

This book is the collaboration oftwo parts of mind divided by that blow. Gerald, the retired psychologist, gives the straight savings scoopin the chapters. Dr. Juan (Trafton Schmeltanzinger) appends one of his nonfriction twists, like this, to each:

What to do in your trailer park daze. Self-sex and dating. Cruise writing treat trips. Verbal nuggets in the park gutter. Trailer Park Shrink Q & A. Healthy habits you can'tfind the time for. And zany ways to pinchpennies.

"Pennies-Fun-Heaven!" wags the slap-happy tale of the priceless life ofa Trailer Park Shrink that you can apply to your present life anywhere.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Mar 23, 2009
• ISBN: 9781467050388

Dr. Juan Trafton Schmeltanzinger

Your Trailer Park Shrink,Dr. Juan Trafton Schmeltanzinger,is the result of a blow to the head of a real retired psychologist.Poor Dr. Juancan't very well tell the real (nonfiction) from the concocted (fiction). This forced him to invent a new form of writing: Nonfriction. Since the stuff, you see, just slips out of him! Schmeltanzinger hassentlots of this stuff to high classmagazines, likeThe New Yorker.But all refuse tosign a delivery receipt. Oh well, Dr. Juan sighs, to each his ozone. Though he fears that such refusal might be a sign of global warning to him not to waste more stamps. Your Trailer Park Shrinkis only writer qualified to rain down "Pennies-Fun-Heaven!" to enrich your life now, regardless of your circumstances.

Book preview

Contents

Introduction

PENNIES-FUN-HEAVEN! MENTALITY

PENNIES

Chapter 1

HOW I ENDED UP HERE

Chapter 2

LOVE AND LUST AND JUST LOOKING

FUN

Chapter 3

CRUISING THROUGH MY WRITING CAREER

Chapter 4

FINDING THE TREASURE IN TRAILER PARK TRASH

Chapter 5

MY PRACTICE ONTARGET AT LAST

HEAVEN!

Chapter 6

GO TO HEALTH EVERY DAY

Chapter 7

PENNIES-FUN-HEAVEN! BUDGETING

Conclusion-

THE PRICELESS LIFE OF A TRAILER PARK SHRINK

Chapter Character

DEDICATION

To Mary Kiyaniki and Ruthie Harrison

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Introduction

PENNIES-FUN-HEAVEN! MENTALITY 

I will spill beans to show how life can be a gas on a few sips of fuel. Every day can be heavenly if you upgrade your outlook and downshift your spending. You will learn to buck the tide of Jones’ buying, and surf waves of saving. I discovered this when I retired on a pittance to a trailer park by the beach next to Mexico.

The amazing result? A priceless life that makes anyone rich, no matter how poor their finances be. A Pennies-Fun-Heaven! Mentality results in budget tips that you cash in for treats. Since no matter how thin you must slice budget cake, you should always include some frosting, too. Mine are cruise writing trips in which the cheapest cabin down deep in the ship feels like a mansion to me.

I will show you how to flip poverty’s grind to a satisfied grin. No pity me here, only how rich can I be!

You’ll get saving tips, yes, but at no one’s expense. Not like with the retiree I know with plenty of dough, who takes from food banks wherever he goes. He throws most away, making no attempt to pass on to the intended. And when he can’t go, sends his compliant wife to scoop up a load that they could well buy. Such cold-hearted greed freezes his soul, no matter how hot his portfolio.

Not having much money is no reason for greed. P-F-H! Mentality means giving what you can—whether time, money, talent, or a pat on the back. The best route to riches is to share what you have with those in need. This makes you welcome anywhere, not shunned like this greedy retiree.

I ended up here when a blow to the head split my mind, and out popped your Trailer Park Shrink. He can’t tell for long what is real and what is not, and keeps shifting his grip between the two. Gerald, the real psychologist I used to be, writes the straight half of each chapter, after which Dr. Juan, my post-blow persona, appends what he thinks is a related piece.

We will slap you happy in three parts of the title. Each is introduced by a pair of quips—one serious, and one silly.

There are, in all, seven underlapping chapters. The first recaps the path I took to this cul-de-sac, while subsequent ones serve up trailer park beans such as these: Love and lust. Cruise writing trips. Verbal nuggets in the gutter. Shrink practice in a snack bar. The wealth of health. And Pennies-Fun-Heaven! budgeting.

Each chapter begins with a crossword of key terms, and a Trailer Park Speak. The text includes some bold Priceless Lines, and ends with Gerald’s Last Word and Dr. Juan’s First. The Conclusion repeats the Speak, Priceless Lines, and Last and First Words. Mixed well, these are your recipe to bake up your own batch of P-F-H! Mentality, no matter your present condition.

Lastly, Chapter Character fingers subheading finds such as these, and more: The Cheezy Whino-o. The Darkest Don. A Flash in the Pam. Lucky Son-of-a-Beach. And, the Thirst AIDS Queen.

What’s the bottom line here? That no matter your age, work status, or finances, you can enrich your life now, and start earning sweet treats. And do this in spite of falls on Wall Street that might crash on the rocks of our economy. Pennies-Fun-Heaven! Mentality, see, can turn the fiercest bear market into your own little cuddly stuffed teddy!

PENNIES 

A fool and his money are soon parted.

—English Proverb

I’ve worked myself up from nothing

to a state of supreme poverty.

—Groucho Marx

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Take your foot off the gas and you’re headed for the pits.

—Trailer Park Speak

Chapter 1

HOW I ENDED UP HERE  

You can now fly in hours from the east coast to the west, but it took me more than half a century to end up here in this trailer park next to Mexico. Let me trace my path for you, noting some landmarks along the way.

I was born before the Second World War into a working class family in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. We lived in a walk-up apartment on Spring Garden Avenue on the ethnic north side of the Allegheny River. Dad came from the German part of Windber, a coalmining town too remote for the Johnstown Flood to find. Mom was a cute little Czech who smoked like a mill and danced on docked riverboats. My big brother was a tubby troublemaker bound to be a felon or a cop; he had a long career as the latter.

Dad got a civil service job at the Pearl Harbor Navy Shipyard in Honolulu. We lived in a barracks-like unit at 8th and C in Makalapa Housing, just in time to be bombed by the Empire of Japan. That was December 7, 1941, the date that Roosevelt said would live in infamy.

After the war dad transferred to the Navy Yard at Long Beach, California, where we lived in more project housing, this time an 800 square feet duplex in Cabrillo Number Two on West Williams Street. We adopted Wolf from the dog pound, a shell-shocked German shepherd vet of the Pacific campaign; we had to keep her chained to prevent her from attacking the Nisei postman.

I entered first grade at Garfield Elementary, which kids in better parts of town called Garbage Field. I soon wormed my way into books where I have been since, thanks to a branch library that went out on a limb to service our slum.

Mom went to night school for her diploma and LVN degree, after which she worked swing shift in a hospital on the other side of the L.A. River divide. It took her two buses, and must have been scary coming home late at night; mom never learned how to drive.

Hawaii? AlAska!

After the eighth grade at Stephens Junior High, we moved to Elmendorf Air Force Base in Alaska, in base housing again, though better insulated, on Government Hill, across the tracks from Anchorage city center. We had an upstairs apartment in a blockhouse of eight, with wall-to-wall carpet, the first time we’d padded in such luxury.

I was in the first class at the new high school where the military bussed us. In the frigid winter we crunched through town under stars and aurora, while at the height of summer sun they began a ball game at midnight with no electric lights. In the brief growing season in the Matanuska Valley, spuds ballooned to watermelons, and the sides of the highway flashed with fireweed and salmon berry.

Mom died in April of our second year there when cancer spread after one lung was removed. A routine X-ray at the Native Service Hospital had led to biopsy and surgery. The earth was still frozen, so she was kept in the fridge until graves could be dug later on. When, decades later, I came to Anchorage as a corporate shrink, I saw that her grave was unmarked. So arranged to have a plaque placed, even though I knew that no one would visit.

Dad and I moved back to Hawaii, my brother having returned to Long Beach after getting fired for beating up a supervisor who had the nerve to try and supervise him. We took an apartment in a low-rise complex on the Ala Wai Canal, the gateway to Waikiki.

Dad worked again at the Pearl Harbor Shipyard as an engineer. I took my junior year at Roosevelt High, a rare haole among local kids. The school, named for the Rough Rider, was the only public one in Honolulu that was English Standard. This meant that you had to speak and write correct English, unlike the other schools where Pidgin was okay. Many Roosevelt grads went to college on the mainland, and returned to play key roles locally.

Dad married Faye, a pretty spinster who had come to Hawaii from Oklahoma. We bought our first home, a Bavarian chalet on Wilhelmina Rise above Kaimuki, overlooking the Ala Wai Canal and Waikiki. For the first time I had a room to myself, with no noisy neighbors a thin wall away. To help Dad and Faye build a new life, I left for California at the end of the year, to stay with my brother who had found steady work as a rookie cop in Long Beach.

We had a ground floor studio of an up-and-down pair. I slept on a couch that turned into a bed when the bolsters were plopped on the floor. This was on Corona Avenue in Belmont Shore, much nicer than where we lived before; we were tucked between Second Street shops and a first class sandy beach.

Priceless Line:

Start where you are, follow your nose, and you will get there.

I graduated from Woodrow Wilson High, my third school in as many years. I paid my way by taking on-campus jobs that rich kids rejected. As an honor roll student, I got accepted to U.C.L.A., where I shared a room in the Co-op with R.C. Jones, a big black tackle on the Rose Bowl football team. We were two of a hundred poor kids who worked around the place to