Maple Estates Mobile Home Park is the kind of place that feels quintessentially small town: sleepy, with wide streets, lots of retired folks and many young families with kids. In this peculiar lull between the sale and my family's imminent move-out date, I find myself reflecting on the life my mother built for us here - and what it means to say goodbye to a trailer park childhood. Twenty-two years later, we are selling that beloved house because my grandmother recently moved in with my mom, and they both need more space. 'They'll drive it down on the back of a BIG truck!' said my mom.Įlsewhere turned out to be a quiet trailer park in a tiny place in southern Alberta called Picture Butte, where our custom-built, kitty vases and all, white-and-green house stands to this day.Įrin Mick, 7, pictured in her home that included the beloved kitty vases. I knew nothing about any of this, except that we had to go elsewhere, and I was thrilled to discover that we could take our beloved house with us.

That mobile home sat on my family's hog farm near Innisfail, Alta., until the pork industry crashed at the turn of the millennium, forcing my family - along with many others - to start over. I fell in love with some supremely '90s cat-shaped vases on display in the office, so you can imagine my five-year-old joy when those were gifted to us with the house. We went to Triple E to pick the layout, the number of cupboards and windows, the colours and everything else. For more information about CBC's First Person stories, please see the FAQ. This First Person article is the experience of Erin Mick who grew up in a trailer park community in Picture Butte, Alta.

Growing up with us