*This is technically a repost of an old & buried piece, so if that doesn't qualify for this challenge no worries

The world drags you down

with tightly packed cubes

made of sugar or offices

but either way, you lose

Long ago it was easy

to run under the sky

hunting, foraging, moving

just trying to get by

You feel that it’s wrong

but can’t move with the weight

they’ve spoonfed your brain

and stacked up your plate

Madness some call it

Madness some say

When you can’t fight the future

You only live for today

Then depression sets in

and surrounds you in waves

your friends are all sinking

you can’t roll any saves

One by one they give in

to the pills or the dark

but within you it burns

that small, little spark

Never it whispers

Not you it roars

If you can’t feel happy

Then I’ll make you soar

Madness some call it

Madness some say

When your mind’s had enough

And it goes its own way

Soon all your thoughts race

through the once empty halls

they tug at your strings

and smash at your walls

You’re drunk on your ego

a wolf among sheep

you can do all you want

except go to sleep

The ride feels so good

when you’re nearing the top

but much like a train

all this crazy must stop

Madness some call it

Madness some say

When you realize you’ve lost

More than just your own way

You clean up your act

you lift and you jog

you start eating veggies

you find a new job

You balance your diet

along with your mood

healthy mind, healthy body

but you’re just being shrewd

For inside you it sleeps

the beast is alive

if you fall in despair

it will make you survive

Madness some call it

Madness some say

But for you it’s a safeguard

Of your ancient DNA

Oh, this wouldn't do.

Nope.

What the hell was this - a mortgage? In this bougie city? Sure, maybe Marxism had been a phase in fifth grade but socialism remained the ultimate stance of the Working Class, and TW would have to work until death.

Who the hell had TW married - this asshole? Bossy, spoiled, inconsiderate - all the shit TW had struggled not to be growing up. What, did we marry a project? No? Then fuck this shit. Let somebody else school that fool. Why should he get to be a jerk when we wasted all our energy being a better person?

This job? This job was shit. Stressful, underpaid, underappreciated. We're not bringing up the socialism again but definitely no. That had to go too.

It took some time, some awful, awful time that felt like death as the pieces of the life that just wouldn't do fell apart one-by-one. There was struggle - like choking old vines that had grown comfortable and wanted to cling to their old supports. Tough shit.

Little T didn't accept weakness.

Since getting into arguments with little boys on the playground at age 5, Little T had held her ground. Always. She'd listened to Grandma -- never fall in love, don't accept the shit they put on you, read and do well in school -- and it hadn't failed her yet. She handled the drama of her well-meaning parents, who'd unfortunately had four too many kids and struggled to raise them all when their own emotional development was still lacking. She had handled the constant expectations of a fucked up school system that rewarded talent and lazy teaching over personal development - typical Capitalist institution, don't spend or invest in anything just take the easy fruit and pay for the present with the ruin of the future - and still maintained a straight-A perfect record with a very active bitch face, thank you. Yet despite all the comments of, "Oh, such an old soul!" she continued to find sanctuary in a room filled with the toys, imagination and stuffed army of her inner child.

Because Little T was still a child - not a third parent or a future scholastic achiever like everybody wanted. And as Little T quickly realized, there were no real "adults"- simply older, bossier humans who felt entitled by experience and made all the same mistakes of their younger counterparts over and over again.

Like this adult Little T had grown into.

Big T needed help. Obviously she'd lost sight of who she'd originally planned to be. No vacation in years? Her dreams of working to make a difference - dashed to pay bills. Her continual search for fun and adventure - set aside indefinitely, partly thanks to a stick in the mud she'd attached herself to. She'd marched headlong into responsibility and drudgery like a good soldier sent to die in the field of adulthood. And now here she sat at 3 A.M., crying in the bathroom with no idea why.

Fuck. That. Shit.

Little T made changes. The hair - fix it. The name - change it, let's be a proper Bond Villain, those ladies were deadly. The home - move it. The job - new one, nonprofit. The body - fell apart, but it had never fit right growing up anyway so fuck it for now. The drugs - ditch 'em, we don't need drugs when we can cope right. The boy - let him go. If little boys couldn't keep up they had to stay behind, that had always been the rule of the playground. Little T didn't follow others, she led. This housewife shit was never gonna work long term, not with some stubborn jerk who couldn't be bothered to console his wife at night. If Little T had to support herself then fuck it - why support someone else.

Slowly Big T started to emerge again. Some silly quirks and mistakes, some glitches here or there, but they worked themselves out. Little T had always planned for a life like Grandma's, and old age was something to look forward to if you played your bridge cards right. Big T just needed a shift and her course would correct just fine.

The new home had space now. Space to rest, in privacy and solitude, without judgement or expectation. Space to create and work, at her own pace and time, on the things she really cared about. Space for pets - including the cats her ex had always resented and hated - with parks to investigate and neighbors to greet. Space that was all Big T, no tired and washed out TW.

And as Big T gradually regained a sense of self, Little T smiled and retreated to the inner walls of the heart she'd always defend.

Because sometimes it takes a little girl to do a warrior's job.

"I don't want to go to therapy because I don't want to get committed/institutionalized." <- OK heard this enough times now that here it is folks:

1) Talking to a therapist does not lead immediately to the psych ward - however NOT talking out your issues can lead to you having a more severe breakdown and being arrested/taken by ambulance if you really want to push your luck.

2) Yes, psych wards suck - there are no privacy curtains on bathrooms (on purpose) and you must attend group sessions/take meds/surrender your phone. But trust me; if you are having a breakdown you do NOT want your phone. This is a blessing. The rest you can live through.

3) Most insurance companies don't want to pay for your stay in a psych ward, so your chances of going are slim unless you're in severe crisis. Most likely the doctors will just put you on meds and make you deal at home as long as possible. Psych wards are expensive. Nobody wants to pay for your ass to have 24/7 care.

4) If you can even contemplate the stigma of being put in a ward chances are you're too sane for one so chill.

5) For anyone who ever has been committed this comment is pretty fucking offensive. You're basically re-stigmatizing us and our experience because you don't want to go through the same thing. While that's relatable, remember who you're speaking to - and remember that if we've lived through it, you're not so precious you can't survive it too.

I don't smoke but I've been eyeing these smokeless "essential oil" inhalers with a lot of temptation. I can't use one, I'm allergic to generally every form of fragrance on the planet - can't breathe it or wear it - so it's a fantasy notion, the idea of having something to fixate my anxiety on that looks cool and doesn't cause cancer that we know of yet.

Anxiety is a nasty word I've learned to live with lately, but not as bad as other words I've dealt with including "depression" "breakdown" and - the utterly last word I ever want to hear again - "bipolar". I lovingly refer to it as my family curse, in about the same way one might refer to lycanthropy; it runs in the tree and you pray to God you never manifest it but every full moon you get nervous and start to wonder. In therapy my psych kindly suggested that I didn't seem "bipolar" - but perhaps I suffered because I'd been raised by a mother who was. Little did this psych realize that by scapegoating the very same parent whose curse I dreaded to bear they put a lynchpin in my decision to stop pursuing children via IVF and thus kick off the end of my marriage of twelve years. Because if simply having a "bipolar" parent can cause such turmoil, then why on earth would I subject another human to the same? Or worse, see them turn into a monster one day just like me?

[For the record despite my mother's diagnosis I am a very loved and spoiled child - never beaten or abused - and hence my rather loyal ire at having my mother scapegoated when she should have been better supported during her own breakdown, and I should have received help too. Notice how even among doctors the stigma of their labels persists.]

I don't talk about my family curse, obviously. It's been my experience people will quickly start to put you into stereotypes and boxes as soon as you present one. Suddenly "Oh, that's why you do that" or "You always did seem so and so" will start to trickle into conversations and you become less a person and more a walking statistic. A werewolf only achieves acceptance by staying in human form and passing for normal.

When I brought up my monstrous metaphor to a friend, after sadly failing to keep the wolf at bay during COVID and other life stressors, they kindly suggested I find the gypsy who cursed my family and get them to lift the curse. They didn't see my curse as a defining personality trait; instead, they had also suffered mental health issues and knew - as I did - that it sucks trying to advocate for yourself in a sea of labels and medications. Yet never had it occurred to me to look more carefully at the curse I'd accepted on my family all those years ago. Intrigued, I took an abnormal psychology course and decided to learn "gypsy".

It was an utterly fascinating and horrifying eight week journey.

The gist of what I gleaned from my semester in psych is this: Psychology is fucking $@!%-t. Over half of all psychiatrists don't even practice it anymore; they just prescribe pills. Which have gained popularity as the "biomedical model" of science continues to push the idea that mental illness is a problem of the person suffering it, not the society or circumstances they find themselves in. Except there isn't actually any concrete physical evidence for mental illness as a biological problem. You may read studies that suggest "oh no there's a genetic factor" or "there's a chemical imbalance" but the actual truth exposed by journalists who finally looked through the reports paid for by pharmaceuticals who have nearly quadrupled their clientele over the past few decades have found that actually, in fact, these ideas are not fully proven yet.

The "chemical imbalance" theory sounds good on paper - your brain simply isn't producing the right stuff, that's the problem - however where it breaks down is the fact that 1) it was disproven 25 years ago but mental health professionals didn't feel the need to share that info with the public because it made prescribing meds easier if they believed they were the problem 2) the chemical imbalances that do exist are actually caused by the medications doctors prescribe you when you're diagnosed; and since there are increasingly fewer unmedicated patients nowadays there are no longer any controls to compare to for any studies that continue to refer to these imbalances.

The brain, once prescribed any of the multitude of drugs pushed by psych wards and often forced upon the homeless or the incarcerated, actually changes structure as it tries to adapt to the new chemicals. This process is called "homeostasis" and generally refers to your body trying hard to keep things status quo. When a chemical starts to block serotonin, for example, your brain will create more receptors to absorb it anyway. In a short period of time your brain absorbs more serotonin than normal and the initial imbalance the doctor suggested you had is now reality. These changes progress and cause the doses to rise up and the condition to worsen. Since the use of lithium to treat bipolar started back in the early 80's, for example, the number of bipolar patients recovering from a manic episode has dropped from over 70% to less than 33%. The drugs make us worse, not better. Probably because none of them are actually developed to treat mental illness because - again - they can't find any physical cause for it. They are instead simply uppers, downers, and sedative derivatives that wreck havoc in the receptors of our grey matter and leave us worse off for it. Or, as a wise man put it, they are a thousand different types of aspirin to ease symptoms, not cure a disease. Placebos actually have a higher success rate than most anti-depressants.

The problem with relying on "genetic" factors for mental illness overlooks the contributing factors of intergenerational trauma + learned behavior/coping skills, all of which pass down from one generation to the next with about the same regularity as genes but could actually be a case of nurture more than nature. If one of your family members is ever diagnosed the only genetic testing they do to see if you've got the same issue is to ask about your family history. I was once actually told by a therapist not to give my family history to an intake psychiatrist, because it only made them lazy about diagnosing my symptoms (which they do in only 10 minutes of talking to you because time is money in hospitals). For further evidence my brother - who was also committed at one point for a mental breakdown - did not know to tell the doctors of our family's "bipolar" curse and was diagnosed with "schizophrenia" instead. Which begs the question - is my family really "bipolar" or "schizophrenic"? Furthermore they haven't found the gene for anything yet - including "bipolar" disorder - even though they're sure it's there. The idea that we can genetically treat mental illness is even further away than the ridiculous attempts we've made at medicating it.

The DSM - The Diagnostic & Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders - is updated every few decades by a board of psychiatrists of whom about 60% have their research fully funded by drug companies. With each iteration of the DSM, the criteria for meeting a set disorder are widened such that new cases often triple within the first year of the manual's publication. Interesting how one book can cause such a huge wave of mental illness. A few psychologists have decried the obvious clash of interests, however the industry persists and there's been little progress made since removing homosexuality as a disorder from the DSM in 1974; feeling distress over being homosexual wasn't removed until 2013.

Which begs the question - exactly what is mental illness and what causes it? Well, the insanely simple suggestion posed by my teacher is that it's natural and it's caused by the world continuing to suck. One of the key points made over and over is that mental illness is always defined by society - and sadly, society often overrides the needs of the individual for the needs of the system when it's meant to be the other way around. Often people who are "mentally ill" are struggling with intense trauma or life circumstances; PTSD - Post Traumatic Stress Disorder - for example is being rebranded now as PTSI - Post Traumatic Stress Injury - because the problem isn't in the person, it's in the situation that broke them. We send soldiers to war then treat them as invalids for witnessing its horrors. We have children suffer attack or abuse then treat them as mentally defective for surviving it. We ignore the loss of home, stability, and community in the homeless population and treat them as if magically they can overcome these basic human needs and function as a sane person while living on the street. Yet in each of these instances the focus is on treating the victim rather than addressing the flaws in our social systems that hurt them. War could be avoided. Families could be better supported in our communities. Housing costs could be regulated. However what will more likely happen is the victim-blaming of those dealing with these larger social evils than society making any meaningful change.

The crazy thing about mental health is that Western scientists literally bend over backwards to ignore everything outside the brain including social background, economic status, race, sex, culture, the whole gamut of overall health and wellness - to focus exclusively on little synapses and genetic coding. The obvious problem with this approach is that our brain isn't disconnected from everything around it. Far from it; in fact, they've proven that subtle changes including light, temperature, social isolation, and diet can all influence one's mood and mental health. Moreover the W.E.I.R.D. - Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, Democratic - countries all have the worst track record for mental illness. And unfortunately they're exporting it, through the paid advocacy of pharmaceutical-funded psychiatrists and increasing Western media coverage of what are increasingly now global disorders including depression, anxiety, anorexia, etc.

As for my stigma - my obstacle, the wolfsbane of my family tree? It's still there. Even after this eye-opening learning of the system that failed three generations of my family and branded us monsters. Curses don't die when you learn the gypsy lied. Because curses live in the continued beliefs of the angry mobs and villagers who listen to them.

And as I pack up the last of my things to move to a small apartment in a brand new city in the boonies (where I can afford to live on a single paycheck) while saying goodbye to friends and places I've known, I eye that homeopathic alternative to smoking and wonder if I had smoked whether it would have eased the anxiety for all those years growing up with a family struggling to cope with mental health issues. Or if it simply would have given me one more obstacle to beat.

Further Suggested Reading for Mental Health Issues In America:

Mad in America: https://www.madinamerica.com/blogs/

This is a blog covering the many failings and critiques of the mental healthcare system, including personal stories from people who have survived it

*If you're not a reader, the main founder/editor of Mad in America, Robert Whitaker, has a series of YouTube videos summarizing his research/findings in the mental health care system from his book Anatomy of an Epidemic, the first part of which you can find here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4R6MXO2j0V0

Crazy Like Us: The Globalization of the American Psyche

This is a fascinating book that delves into how culture informs madness, and how the way we diagnose and describe mental health in society can impact how it manifests among us.

Healing: Our Path from Mental Illness to Mental Health

This is a perhaps overly optimistic book by the former head of the National Institute of Mental Health that takes a critical look at America's mental healthcare system and its failings, as well as some suggestions for fixing it.

A friend recently recommended I watch Horror Noire: A History of Black Horror on Shudder. It's a documentary that covers the history of horror movies from the perspective of African Americans, covering their portrayal as well as the themes embedded in horror that capture some of the undertones of racism in America throughout the years, from early horror films to the latest and greatest Get Out. It's an excellent documentary which I highly recommend - but it's not what I want to review here.

While watching it there was a moment where they discussed the old 70's horror+blaxploitation film Blacula starring William Marshall - who was present to talk about the film which was cool to see. They discussed tropes in how the two genres blended together and how the fears and racism of the era played into them. It was also really cool to see Marshall talk about his role - but that's also not the film I want to review here.

The black horror film I want to review, which was released by the same studio, is Sugar Hill. I went back to watch it again after this documentary because I could understand things better than when I first saw it back as a little ten year old girl. It aged even better than I had remembered.

If you're wondering why a ten year old was watching horror movies in my Grandma's defense, she didn't supervise me or set a bedtime when I spent the night on weekends. I was a pretty responsible kid, with a clean track record - no need. Which meant from ten at night to one in the morning I had full access to all the many channels on the good cable package she splurged for including AMC.

In the middle of the night there wasn't much to watch back in the day; so I fell into watching old episodes of Twilight Zone which eventually gatewayed into old science fiction movies like the original The Omega Man (you may know its remake I Am Legend better). During October they cranked up the classic horror movies and in addition to Blacula they also showed Sugar Hill which appealed to me because I honestly didn't think of it like a horror movie. To me, it was more like a superhero story with my hero Diana "Sugar" Hill.

Diana (played by Marki Bey who, fun fact, later ran murder mystery cruises with her husband after she retired from film) is enjoying time at the nightclub owned by her boyfriend when suddenly the mob shows up to demand protection money. When he refuses the gang find him after hours and kill him, paving the way for their leader to sweep in and buy up the club from his grieving widow.

Except Diana isn't your typical widow - and instead of giving in she marches to find Mama Maitresse, the voodoo queen. She asks her for the power to kill her enemies and together they summon Baron Samedi, the Lord of the Dead, to borrow his army of the undead. Instead of your George Romero brand brain-eaters though, the zombies of this film are slaves from Guinea, buried in unmarked graves after dying en route to America. Instead of rotting flesh their bodies are perfectly preserved and covered in cobwebs, dirt, and dust from their burial ground. Their eyes have that old 70's monster bubble sheen and they still wear the clothes and shackles they died in as they rise to do the Baron's bidding.

*On a personal note this was a huge deal for younger me. I used to have recurring nightmares about zombies and they were my ultimate fear when it came to horror movies back in the day. Yet in this zombie movie they weren't monsters but the unjustly murdered. And they weren't terrorizing the town but helping the heroine take down the mob. This fact alone cemented Sugar as my idol and made my little head flip as though I'd found my own personal Disney princess. Fuck singing birds and mice - a strong woman needs zombie friends.

The film played out nice and slow, as good revenge goes, with the death of each of the mobsters who participated in murdering Diana's man. Between scenes of Diana playing it up as the respectful, good-mannered widow (during which they style her hair flat) you watch each gangster get lured away from the crowds by the hilarious trickster Baron; he disguises himself as a taxi driver, a pool hall hustler, a bartender, and even a super racist-trope gardener that plays up the inside joke of not being recognized for the powerful entity he truly is. His appearance serves as a warning for the upcoming gore, as his zombies follow shortly behind.

But it's not just the Baron who appears before their doom. Sugar appears in the flesh - only this time in a full power suit with a stunning afro. To me it felt like watching a real live superhero with an alter ego - like Diana the Wonder Woman during the day (I caught the name selection early in the movie) and then Sugar the Zombie Queen dispensing justice at night. Her kind demeanor quickly falls away with her stone cold righteous fury as she explains to each mobster exactly why they will die. As they beg for mercy she completely ignores their pleas, even shrugging off their screams of terror as the zombies do their work. In one of the more gruesome scenes the zombies throw a man into a pit of starving pigs. All Sugar can say is, "I hope they're into white trash."

The absolute drop dead power of Sugar was eye-opening for me, although in the greater context I have to acknowledge once again more tropes. As a little girl I was accustomed to women characters being strong but also gentle - they scolded, they forgave, and they ultimately took the high road. In every single female led film and show I watched the underlying message that the "fairer sex" played fair was constantly repeated, unless of course you were a villain (and even many of those softened up in the end). But here was a woman - not a villain by any means, but justified - showing all the stoniness of a male action hero slaughtering the bad guys without flinching. As a little girl who constantly grew frustrated at being told to be good, quiet, kind, and compassionate - I wanted to shout and whoop at the screen in joy at the release from those awful norms. Sadly it was late at night so I had to stay quiet.

That said there's likely a reason why it's a black female protagonist that finally got to show me this side of feminism. Since I've grown up I've read that the way black women were often portrayed made them seem cold/hard on purpose; it's called "The Strong Black Woman Trope" and while it might not sound bad to associate strength with black women the problem lies when those kind of racist stereotypes continue to play out in the real world. For example in health care - black women are often expected to "tough it out", and are less likely to be listened to, prescribed pain medications, be given preventative care, etc. I'd like to emphasize here how wrong that really is; nobody should have to turn hard to be heard.

But back to my idol for now - after Sugar finally finishes off the last mob boss her deal with the Baron is done. In an ironic - particularly for horror - twist the Baron decides he likes Sugar too much to take her with him back to the land of the dead as promised. Instead, he takes the whiny racist white bitch left alone now by her dead mobster husband. Like a true gentleman he makes a point though that he would have preferred Sugar - obviously, this white bitch is awful - but instead he gifts her his skull cane then carries his new screaming bride off screen. While you could see this as a problematic reaffirmation of black men terrorizing white women, in the context of the common themes of horror movies where black characters were constantly expected to sacrifice themselves to save the white - often female - leads, it is actually refreshing to see a white character finally sacrificed to save the black lead instead.

The film ends with Sugar power posing with the baron's cane like a boss. I'm running out of time to cover the "pimp" culture promoted in blaxploitation films, but at the time all that went way over my head. All I remember is rushing home the next day and asking my mom if I could wear bell bottoms and put my hair up in an afro. I wanted to be just like Sugar.

If you want to watch Sugar Hill you can rent it on Vudu/Fandango. It has a pretty decent 63% Rotten Tomatoes score, but for me it will remain my favorite zombie movie of all time. While I can now appreciate it as a black horror film with more important context than simple revenge, to ten year old me it was my horror film - the exact medicine I needed to find my own strength and embrace the zombies of my nightmares. Because the real monsters are often not of the supernatural but the human variety.

*Went over the word limit but as I think those are for chumps here it is anyway - and here's the original Challenge: https://theprose.com/challenge/13412

The town was perfect.

White picket fences as far as the four-legged companion could run. Property values rising exponentially over the years. Manicured, drought-resistant landscaping. Great school scores. Impeccable walkability - but not at the expense of ample parking - and a clean, zero-emission transit system. Organic farmer's markets year round with chic boutique-style food trucks offering gourmet samplings for discerning tastes.

Microbreweries and wine tastings. Socially conscious city council members with credentials for days. Carefully crafted zoning laws and planned greenery in strategic locations including public parks at every other corner.

Then the Shiftless came.

It was a trickle at first. Just a handful of vagrants who got too tired passing through. Probably mentally addled and obviously not educated. Dirty skin of many colors, hoarded junk and tents, hiding in unused corners and corporate parking lots.

The Civilized decried these incursions. They were a blight on their otherwise perfect city. How dare they encroach!

Then dissent ran its course, like an ugly wrinkle on the brow of calm repose. Some called for the guards to run them out of town - ship them to another area, throw away their makeshift domiciles, protect their precious property values which continued to climb higher and higher despite the growing piles of human throwaway. Others begged mercy, setting up temporary shelters inviting the Shiftless to programs, classes, medications, all the things the Civilized knew would help the hidden gems of society buried inside these poor souls. Yet neither approach worked and the Shiftless grew in number, year by year and season by season.

Yet the property values continued to rise, despite a few hiccups here and there. The value of the town maintained.

As the attacks on the Shiftless grew so did a strange disease. People started to disappear. Signs saying "For Hire" popped up in window after window, as the boutiques and breweries struggled to keep up with servicing the Civilized. The busboys bussed out of town. The waitresses quit waiting for a second shift. The cashiers cashed out.

"Why are the Shiftless not taking these positions?" demanded the Civilized. Dissent again reared its ugly head. Education was floated as one solution, but yet others argued the Shiftless were incapable of hard work otherwise they'd not have fallen to their current state. Medication and interventions might fix their mental state, make them more amenable to work.

For the Civilized had need of a working class to maintain their amenities. And surely the Shiftless had need of work to feel whole.

The property values hit new heights never seen before in history. Rents, barely constrained, peaked higher and higher. The housing market continued to thrive despite the lack of housed around it.

Then the Fire came.

There had been other fires but not here - not in such a perfect town. A town that had done everything right. That had emphasized sustainability and clean living. Neither stopped the fire. It consumed those homes - millions upon millions of dollars of homes - like just another cheap pile of sticks on a fire. The Civilized mourned the loss of their equity, their community, their livelihoods, and began the necessary steps to rebuild.

However...there was nobody around to build. The carpenters had gone into the woodwork. The plumbers had drained away. The electricians had zapped out of town. Not one landscaper remained to turn the blackened earth into designer stone and locally-sourced plant life.

The Civilized howled and threw more and more money at the problem...but their money had been linked to their precious homes. And like them it had gone up in smoke.

Some of the Civilized moved in with family, trying to get back on their feet. Others had no family left to help and ended up moving from one motel to the next, working out of suitcases and spending hours on the phone trying to find another rental as the rents drove up again with surging demand. Jobs dried up. Vacancy signs went dark. And as if under a dark spell, one-by-one, the Civilized turned...changed...shifted.

.....

Now, this town was perfect.

Been fifteen long years

Since I bid it goodbye

Never shed any tears

Had no reason to cry

Met a cute city boy

Settled down for awhile

Found myself some real joy

And a reason to smile

But like a god-damn farm hand down on my luck

All I got now's my dog and a new pickup truck

Didn't count on leavin'

Thought I'd stay here for life

Had no causes for grievin'

Was a happy young wife

Till our plans hit a wall

That I just couldn't break

Now he's keeping it all

'Cept this heart he won't take

And like a god-damn farm hand down on my luck

All I got now's my dog and a new pickup truck

So I bought a guitar

Found a new place to rent

That'll get me as far

As I wish he'd get bent

And one day I may play

This sad little song

You can move miles away

But the country ain't gone

'Cause like a god-damn farm hand down on my luck

All I need is my dog and a new pickup truck <3

Hey Prosers!

I am finally publishing the last of my NSFW erotic comedy series - it's done! I can now check off "self-published dime store smut" from my life bucket list.

Honestly speaking, that's basically the only thing I'm proud of with this series. It's not the best series - not even my best writing, it's cringeworthy at times - BUT I finished it and put it out there. For me this is important because typically my crippling perfectionism kills any attempts I make at trying new things. In this case though I managed it specifically BECAUSE I told myself this was worthless garbage meant to fail - and my brain bought the trick.

I can perfectly fail this!

In the spirit of owning my silliness and recognizing my true reasoning I'm adjusting all my books down to $.99/each. This means I will make a paltry $.35/each on the evil Amazon and I'm not even sure what everywhere else - but I've also only sold like 8 books, so meh. Not like I'm quitting my day job. This was a side quest.

*Note: Amazon will take up to 72 hours to register the pricing change, so stay tuned!

Here are links to all three books in series order if anyone cares to peruse:

Alpha, Beta, Omega: The Green & The Gold

https://books2read.com/u/baZ6o8

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09263DLQ9

Alpha, Beta, Omega: The Gold & The Blue

https://books2read.com/u/3JZ6WK

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09DKFVB3R

Alpha, Beta, Omega: The Blue & The Green (releasing 5/5/22!)

https://books2read.com/u/md6G8Z

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09YQLX9L5

Thanks Proser community for supporting my re-engagement of writing as a pastime, even if a silly one that will not fund my living expenses :)

Last Call,

Harper Daily (my ridiculous smut pen name, hereforwith retired)

Impulse control

the fidgeting

the drumming

the humming

Filtered sentences

too many

too loud

too much

Strained focus

trying to listen

trying to look

trying to wait

Emotional waves

held in

passing by

wiping out

*When it takes so much to be someone

that others can stand

It is exhausting to struggle and know

you can't lean

because the real you

would only

push them

away.