Community Bulletin Board Fuck Your Tiny Home What the Neighbors Dont Need to Know
By Robert Kinnaird
Everyone in the neighborhood has secrets, and we both know you’re no different. Your life looks perfect. Your beautiful Caitlin-lynne and Samisamillion are “happy” and “not in emotional turmoil”. But we both know that’s a façade. You aren’t the perfect mom and the reality is that your family is built on lies. We know you’re in a loveless marriage, you haven’t had an orgasm in 13 months, and your children couldn’t even get into Dartmouth. We know everyone’s secrets, and if you don’t pay your dues, everyone will know yours. You’ve been good about your dues. You really have. But this month you’re behind. And your fence hasn’t been repainted. What the hell? Originally, we started looking into you to try and find out why your grass is cut 2 centimeters above regulation length, but what we found in the end was distressing to say the least. That time your son smoked weed Remember when people asked why it was that Samisamillion didn’t go to college like the rest of the neighborhood kids? You laughed it off with a casual chuckle and a little something about your son studying abroad. We know that you’ve been photoshopping all his Instagrams in Spain while he toils away in a monastery repenting his sins behind closed doors. But why such a harsh punishment just for weed? Just make him smoke a whole pack like the rest of us. Or maybe you don’t want him to end up like you. You never finished high school Yeah. We know. The rest of the neighborhood is unaware of how you packed up and left home at 15 to run away with a commune in the post-Woodstock/pre-disco era. We know how you lived out of a VW van for five years, never calling home, never once looking back. Living on the lamb like a damn hippie without so much as a diploma to wipe your ass with. That was until… the incident. The incident We know what happened to your twin sister. We know how she went to visit you out in Washington State. We know that one of you never came back. What happened to Samantha, Judith? What happened to her? Did you kill her? Where did you hide the body, Judith? Tell us the truth! We aren’t going to report you to the police, we just need to update the information on the neighborhood carpool list! Even if you don’t tell us, The Homeowner’s Association will know soon enough. We always find out. Your real name That’s right we know your real name, Judith, and it’s not what you wrote on the HOA forms. (There’s a fine for that by the way). We know all about how you took the opportunity to get out that you needed. You’re too selfish for a commune, so you did what you had to do. Now her fiancé is your husband. Her baby is your daughter. Her HOA dues are your, now much larger, HOA dues. The gold There’s one last thing we know Judith. We know about the gold. Your parents, the fabulously wealthy heirs to a secret fortune recently passed (sorry for your loss. Thoughts and prayers), and with their passing, their money passed to you. We know your grandpappy was among the first soldiers into Nazi Germany. And we know about the gold. Millions and millions worth of nazi gold that was just there for the taking. Any soldier would have been a fool to pass it up. But your grandpappy wasn’t a soldier. He was an animal. Specifically, I’d probably say a wolverine? Or Maybe a Komodo Dragon. I dunno, but it’s something you can’t trust. Anyway, he turned on his own men, killing each and every one of them so there wouldn’t be a brick to share. He came back a war hero, the only survivor of his battalion. But we know what really happened. So where’s the gold now, huh Judith? Your dues are up, and we only accept nazi gold. We’ll be in touch. Judith. Sincerely, The Homeowner’s Association
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By William Faber
My Large Dwelling is Superior
Hey fuckface, I saw you and your gorgeous miniature house ride into my neighborhood on the back of a Chevrolet Colorado yesterday, and I want you to know that you are not welcome here. Your elegantly designed tiny home is not cool; get over it. Do you think that you’re chic just because you live in an eight by eight cube that contains all of life’s essentials while somehow still feeling spacious? It doesn’t make you interesting and it doesn’t mean you have better taste than me and it doesn’t mean that my beautiful wife is hiding a budding crush on you. You’re a fool, a cute yet naive baby boy, if you think that my ugly overpriced windowless McMansion doesn’t bring me the exact same amount of joy as the bright, soul-lifting interior of your Love Box. Sometimes, I run laps in my living room, not only because I have the space for it, but because the wind tousling my hair is the only thing that keeps me from breaking down my door and running into my college aged son’s old treehouse. (I feel safe there, okay? Do you understand that, you moron, you nitwit?) I want you to understand how much hate I have in my heart. This hate is for you: it’s all for you. I do not care about you. I do not care that you spent months crafting the perfect home to take with you on your adventure through the boundless fields of life. I do not care that you have found the lifestyle that fondles your heartstrings and plucks at your dopamine receptors. I do not care that I found my house on Craigslist and blew the millions of dollars I was saving for a peaceful retirement in a lakeside lodge with endless painting supplies on it. I bet you’re inside coping with your ambitionless lifestyle by smoking weed and making Dadaist found-material sculptures. I know that what I’m about to say may deeply hurt you, but that’s the point, so I’m saying it anyway, shithead. Your art has no point. You don’t own any land, so where are you going to put it? I would call the police to report your weed possession, but I am much too busy driving my four and a half hour commute to the Plastics Company to waste my time on your disregard for the Law. And yeah, I care about the Law. I was supposed to be a lawyer, in fact. It turns out it’s hard to pass those classes while spending all day in the sand garden I kept in my backyard, tripping on mushrooms, drawing spirals in those grains because the art that is most temporary is the most beautiful. Now I’m a business administrator with a house that doesn’t have a backyard because I replaced it all with one giant, unused tennis court . Life is good for me, and you should be in jail. Maybe you need an image to understand how furious you make me. When I see your blonde dreadlocks, I am angry. It makes me think of the one vacation I got as a child. I stood by the lake, my bare feet sinking into the dirty sand, and I skipped stones until it got dark. My dad had to come out and get me because supper was starting. We ate the fish my brother and uncle had caught that day. I wouldn’t stop talking about how the stones felt in my hand. Cool and smooth. Ever since then, I catch myself doodling rocks on the meeting handouts, wishing I had a brush. Sometimes they come out as flawless as the ones I threw when I was ten. Sometimes they’re rough and jagged. That’s what came to my mind when I caught you having a threesome in my backyard. I assume it was because they wanted to do it outside and you don’t own property. I guess you made it work. Listen. I do care about your happiness, about where you’re going and where you’ve been. I care about the leftover hurt in your heart: I want to know if there’s something I can do about it. Let me hold you. Let me listen to your troubles. Please. Invite me to your tiny home.
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