HARD TIMES... or what seemed like it (Part 53a)

Before Elle left for home with her brother we packed up the trailer for the move to North Carolina. I had the things we needed for the baby packed in the car. I quickly learned the value of a convertible when it came time to load the crib and carriage. All I had to do was put the top down and load it. When loaded all I had to was put the top back up instead of fighting to fit things through doors that were too small. We timed her trip home to take place the day before the horses were to ship. Was I ever thankful that we’d decided on that. One of the horse vans broke down in Massachusetts and we sat by the side of the road for almost 5 hours. I didn’t even want to think of what that would’ve been like with Elle and the baby.

Once at the track things started going smoother although it took a few days to find a place to stay that I felt we could afford. Actually, we couldn’t but AJ agreed to advance me some money against future pay. It was a 21 foot, 8 foot wide trailer parked right across the street from the track. When I unloaded the crib there was barely enough room to get past it and to the back of the trailer. AJ had to wait a few days to enter our horses in the races which gave me the chance to go into Boston to pick up Elle and the baby. I had thought that the train was arriving at the North Station and went into a panic when she didn’t get off. After calming down and talking to the station master he located her at the South Station. When I caught up with her she was a mental and physical wreck... and mad at me for not being there when she got off the train. The baby was hungry and crying because when Elle had tried to breast feed her there was little milk. That and the fact that it had been almost seven hours since she last changed her “package” and the back of her dress was obviously wet. By the time we got to the track she had pretty much calmed down but was still unhappy. Seeing her new “home” didn’t help matters either.

AJ had advanced my pay so I could buy food. We hadn’t budgeted for formula because when Elle had left for home she was still producing all the milk the baby needed. After buying a weeks supply of formula there wasn’t much left for food for the two of us. I remember eating cereal for both breakfast and lunch for that whole first week. Because there were so many horses at the track and we didn’t have but 14 horses there were a few nights that we didn’t have any horses racing. I was lucky and got a job taking horses from other stables to the paddock at $10 each which took some of the pressure off for our second week. There were no neighbors and the only person Elle got to talk to was the old woman who owned the house and property where our rental trailer was parked. I won’t say she was unfriendly but she didn’t have much of a personality. AJ’s wife had stopped in Massachusetts for the first two weeks where she had family so she wasn’t an option for Elle. I didn’t know many of the trainers and drivers and although I made an effort to make friends it was obvious that the “locals” looked at us as interlopers coming in to take their money.

The two owners who had been driving their own horses (with not much success) weren’t coming up so AJ finally got to drive them. One of them had been rated a mid grade “B” horse the previous season. But, with the poor drives the owner had given him he was now a low “C” (on an “A”, “B”, “C” classification scale). There was nothing wrong with the horse and I had this overwhelming feeling that AJ would win with him the first race he started. Even though I had the $10 that I’d earned the night before in my pocket I knew that anything can happen in a horse race and that if I lost any of it we wouldn’t have the money to pay for washing the baby’s diapers. So I didn’t bet him and he won paying around $12 as I remember it. If I’d bet but $5 I would’ve won $30. I was happy that AJ had won but it was somewhat bittersweet in that I felt I couldn’t have bet on him.

It was obvious to me that AJ was somewhat desperate to do well while racing at this track because when we left here we’d be heading for North Carolina for the Winter and his income would be reduced. With that mindset there was no way he was going to let me drive in any races. That didn’t make me any happier. I was unhappy. Elle was unhappy. The baby was unhappy (she didn’t take to the formula all that well). AJ was unhappy because he was only getting his horses in to race about every 10 days (as opposed to once a week all Summer long). It ended up being one very long month.

AJ had planned on staying until the season closed in the middle of November. As I explained in some earlier posts you entered your horses four days before they would race (enter Monday for a Thursday race). With so many horses (600) on the grounds and only 432 racing per week it was like playing roulette in getting yours horses in to race. Discouraged by the end of the first week in November, AJ decided it was a waste of time and decided to head for North Carolina. Elle’s parents, knowing they wouldn’t see her or the baby until at least mid April, decided to make a spur of the moment trip up to see us before we left. I’m being kind when I describe them as being “frugal”. As such, they NEVER ate out at a restaurant. That meant that we would have to plan on feeding them the day they would be with us (which was a Sunday with us shipping out on Thursday). The cheapest thing Elle could think of was meat loaf. I really didn’t want to give her the $5 to buy the meat and fixings but I didn’t have much choice. It was about an 8 hour trip for them so they drove to relatives in Massachusetts on Saturday and got to us about 10am on Sunday. The very first thing they said was that they were taking us out for a “good Sunday dinner”. I remember almost choking when I heard it. That was a whole tank of gas that was sitting in our refrigerator and we had a 750 mile trip coming up.

To be continued...