Where It All Goes Down
Pacific Grove, CA
The New Kid
Leigh Botts has just moved from Bakersfield, California, to Pacific Grove, California. Pacific Grove is a little town by the ocean that is super important to Mom because she's always loved the ocean breezes, and she's finally getting to settle down. This makes Leigh the new kid in town and school, which leads to no friends and no dad around.
Leigh mentions that he lives near some pretty fancy golf places, where rich people play. That's a total understatement because Pacific Grove is next door to probably the most famous golf course in the country: Pebble Beach. When Leigh's mom is making food for golf tournaments, that's probably where she's working. Hey, maybe she met Tiger Woods. Oh wait, he was only 9 when Cleary wrote the book. Well, he could have been friends with Leigh, at least.
Bakersfield, where Leigh's family lived before the divorce, is in California's Central Valley, a huge area of the state where about half of America's fruits and vegetables are grown. His dad was one of probably thousands of truckers who worked hauling produce around the Central Valley in giant trucks. Leigh tells us that one thing you don't read about is that most of the scenery in the Central Valley is pretty boring:
It's so boring that the cattle on the feedlot don't even bother to moo. They just stand there. They don't tell you that part in school when they talk about California's Great Central Valley. (14.4)
Consider us told.
The Tiny House
Before the divorce, the Botts family lived in a mobile home…and Leigh hated it. Now, Mom and Leigh are in a teeny, tiny place. Leigh gets the bedroom and his mom sleeps on the couch in the living room, but "Mom says at least it keeps the rain off, and it can't be hauled away" (13.3). A mobile home is, well, mobile. It can be hauled away. The illustration of their house shows how really tiny it is. It's sandwiched in between a bigger house and a gas station—it looks more like a big shed, really. The illustration really gives you an idea of Mom and Leigh's financial situation. You can also see why Leigh might be a little embarrassed about where he lives.
The little house is important because it represents being settled, as opposed to being constantly on the move like Dad. Leigh is a little embarrassed about how small the house is. But when his friend Barry wants to come over, it makes him feel better about it. It makes it feel more like home to Leigh when you can have a friend over.