Kansas after London

After I got back to Topeka, Aunt Heinrich Himmler invaded my house, and I should have known better than to say anything against her precious Kansas, even a criticism of the weather. Actually, she showed up about an hour after I got home, and she was soon followed by some of my local cousins, even though I really wanted to be alone. I said, “I’m finding it harder to adjust to the weather than to the time change. I’ve gotten accustomed to temperatures typically in the sixties.” She actually claimed that Kansas is a great place to live, and she said to go ahead and complain about the weather and such, because then people won’t move here, won’t know what a “wonderful place” it supposedly is. The only reason behind this that she actually expressed is the cleaner air in Kansas, something that she mentioned after I had said I occasionally blew my nose and saw black spots on my tissue. The majority of Kansans, like Aunt Heinrich Himmler, eagerly vote for politicians who are out to destroy the environment; as usual, her psychotic delusions are the height of absurdity. You can have your hellhole, and eat it too. Topeka pollutes the mind, the heart, and the soul. It is a fascist hellhole, a cultural wasteland, and an intellectual graveyard. Fortunately for me, however, I have books and Internet access and have turned my house into a one-woman artist commune. I may be in Topeka physically, but I am rarely here otherwise. Big cities have a reputation for being alienating and lonely places, but in St. Louis I was never as alienated as I am in Topeka.

This encounter took place in my house only an hour or two after I arrived from my trip. Not only Aunt Heinrich Himmler, but also a few other local relatives dropped in, and I would have been exhausted after traveling without having alienating relatives in my house. One of them is a teenage boy who was picking on his sister. Cooties. It all felt so invasive and inappropriate for them to come to my house when I had just got back from a vacation that my sister ruined and I desperately wanted to be alone. When they left, I hastily bolted the door, feeling deeply depressed. Relatives are an abomination.