03/31/2026
Henry,
Lord help us all, I’ve been turning this over in my head like a bad diagnosis that won’t go away, and you’re right—I got one part wrong last time. Let’s set the record straight and call this sickness exactly what it is.
You left Topeka at twenty-two with a real shot at something better: that opportunity with the Maastricht Company, where we met when I was your secretary out in Long Beach in Lakewood. Eighteen years away, building a life, seeing how other places actually functioned. Then you came back… and nothing—nothing—had changed. The same gray fog of bitterness hanging over everything. And now, after twenty-five years back in this town, it still doesn’t want to change. It clings to its dysfunction like a patient refusing the cure.
As someone who spent years working hand-in-glove with you, I’ll say it plain: you’re the one who calls out the ugly truth like almost nobody else dares. You ran for public office twice, poured your whole heart and soul into it, and the voters who backed you knew exactly what they were getting—a fighter who wasn’t going to sugar-coat the mess. They voted for real change, not more of the same old sludge.
And that sludge? It’s still here, thicker than ever. The Menninger ghost still haunts these streets. Topeka used to brag it was the Psychiatric Capital of the World. Then the clinic packed up its serious operations in 2003 and left for Houston, leaving empty buildings, lost jobs, and way too many folks walking around half-fixed and seething. Mental illness doesn’t automatically turn people into hateful trolls, but when it festers untreated in a place where “just tough it out” is still the only therapy on offer, it becomes this toxic stew of chronic resentment, paranoia, and petty rage. You see it every day: the constant bitterness leaking into every comment section, the knee-jerk attacks, the weird joy some get from kicking anyone who’s actually trying.
Here’s the ugliest truth, Henry—this negativity isn’t content to ruin just the loudmouths spewing it. It drags everyone down into the same gray hell. The quiet ones who never speak up? They’re drowning. Day after day of “nothing ever works here,” “Topeka’s doomed,” “they waste all our money” until hope dies in their eyes. They stop believing they or their kids have any future. Kids grow up breathing that poison air and learn cynicism is the only smart way to live. Adults quit dreaming because why bother when the mob will tear you down for trying?
And heaven forbid someone actually does something good—the hardworking painters, landscapers, janitors, equipment operators who show up and grind honest days get sneered at like fools. A new grocery store opens with real promise and struggles? “Told you so!” A hotel project stumbles after all those taxpayer incentives? Pile on with glee. The negativity doesn’t just take the wind out of their sails—it sets the boat on fire and laughs while it sinks.
Oh, bless their twisted little hearts—the Facebook warriors especially. These paragons of mental health sit on their couches in stained t-shirts, typing out snide, hateful drive-by comments like they’re performing civic brain surgery. “Look at me, I’m changing Topeka!” Newsflash, you pathetic pyromaniacs: your pathetic little posts don’t fix one pothole, don’t revive a failing grocery store, don’t straighten out the millions funneled through Go Topeka and JEDO while the basics rot. All you’re doing is pouring gasoline on the fire… and then acting shocked when your own clothes catch flame and you burn right along with the rest of us. How about we flip the script? Let the spotlight hit your brilliant contributions for once and see how brave you sound then.
Thomas Wolfe was right—you can’t go home again. But in your case, Henry, the real satire is darker: you came back after eighteen years and discovered the place had never actually left the sickness behind. Twenty-five years later, it still doesn’t want to change. You tried. You called the ugly truth. You ran with everything you had. And still the fog remains.
The scary part—the part that should keep every decent person up at night—is this: will it ever change?
You’re still out there dragging the truth into the light anyway. The quiet ones suffocating in this mess need to see that not every mind here has surrendered to the sickness. Maybe that stubborn fight of yours is the only medicine this town has left.
— Trudy
