{"title":"Sagebrush City collection","description":"\u003cp\u003eI ran a crisis agency in Sagebrush City. This put me in charge of rescuing other adults from their bad decsions, environment, and bad luck.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis is a disturbing arrangement once you have met an adult. I wrote down what happened, which has historically been a source of tension with the county.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIf you need a laugh, mine were obtained at considerable professional expense. Please enjoy them. The county paid for part of this and would be furious to learn it had produced something you wanted.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ePick a book. We have a brief opportunity to enjoy a public expenditure.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"crisis","title":"Crisis","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe stories that never made the official report.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI worked crisis in Sagebrush City, a desert city in the Southwest where the bus doesn't come and the benefits office keeps moving farther from the bus line.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMost days, the best I could do was keep a bad day from turning permanent.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe names have been changed, and so have a lot of the details, to protect everyone, including me.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eKorey was one of my clients. Just under 350 pounds, powered by snack food and stubbornness, with a brain that flickered between brilliance and static depending on the day. A late bus or the wrong letter in the mail could knock his whole week sideways. He also made me laugh harder than anybody else in Sagebrush.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOne night the community center needed somebody to host the late-night call-in show. Korey was the only person in the room. He'd come for the air conditioning.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe callers said the things people don't say in daylight. Korey usually felt like a leftover. He turned out to be good at answering.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe didn't get fixed. He went back to his game consoles and his bus theories and his nachos.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThen one day I showed up for a home visit, and the police were already there.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI also did private adoptions. When I got everything right, a newborn went straight from the hospital to a family with the nursery already built, instead of to an orphanage. People think America doesn't have orphanages. We have orphanages in every state.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBefore every handoff, I held the baby and said my name. No form ever asked for that part.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSun comes up. Nonsense clocks in. So do I.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eCrisis\u003c\/strong\u003e is one of ten Sagebrush City books. Read them in any order.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEbook (epub), delivered right after purchase.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eIncluded free:\u003c\/strong\u003e Jukebox, a short bonus Sagebrush City book.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Reality Services Office","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54152556249272,"sku":null,"price":9.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0978\/4459\/2824\/files\/Crisis_1500x1200T.png?v=1790882450"},{"product_id":"wrongevent","title":"Wrong Event","description":"\u003cp\u003eHalf of crisis work is figuring out what's actually happening.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI worked crisis in Sagebrush City, a desert city in the Southwest. What was actually happening was rarely what anybody expected, including me.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe names have been changed, and so have a lot of the details, to protect everyone, including me.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTheo was always dressed for the wrong event. A Hawaiian shirt and sandals to court. A three-piece suit and a pocket square to ask about a utility bill. Nobody ever asked Theo why. We just watched. In court, Theo behaved perfectly.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWe sent Darone to Community Outreach for a food box. He found one employee trying to unload a delivery van while answering questions from a full waiting room, so Darone helped unload the van.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThree days later he was still there, helping. Before long, other clients would only go to Community Outreach on the days Darone worked. He lasted almost a year, longer than several actual employees.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe did get the food box eventually. He just couldn't remember when.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eDelroy walked out on Shanice and their three kids and left no forwarding address. Years later he came back for his daughter's graduation. Sober three years and eight months, clothes that fit, a maintenance job at an apartment complex.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe didn't ask anybody to tell him he'd done right. He said he did wrong. Tallulah, one of our clients, asked whether he'd do it again.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"If everything was exactly the same? Yes.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe man we'd spent years trying to stabilize had stabilized by walking away from every person who had a right to expect him to stay.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eWrong Event\u003c\/strong\u003e is one of ten Sagebrush City books. Read them in any order.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEbook (epub), delivered right after purchase.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eIncluded free:\u003c\/strong\u003e Jukebox, a short bonus Sagebrush City book.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Reality Services Office","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54152586428600,"sku":null,"price":9.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0978\/4459\/2824\/files\/Wrong_Event_1500x1200T.png?v=1790882451"},{"product_id":"sovereignterritory","title":"Sovereign Territory","description":"\u003cp\u003eI worked crisis in Sagebrush City, a desert city in the Southwest. When nobody official showed up, people set up governments of their own.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe names have been changed, and so have a lot of the details, to protect everyone, including me.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eDuane T. Fink got elected president of a weekly motel, fourteen votes to nine. Management insisted nobody lived there. Everybody was a guest, including a few guests who'd been staying since the Clinton administration.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThen a resident knocked on Duane's door at two in the morning, because management wasn't answering the phone.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAlmost two years in, Duane told me what being president means. \"Everybody needs somebody to blame who they can still talk to. They cannot talk to corporate. Half the time they cannot find the manager. They can find me.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHank ran a restaurant near our office and fed our clients for years, whether they could pay or not. One of them robbed Hank anyway. He took a cherry pie.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHank fed him again. The man eventually paid for another pie and never robbed Hank again. Hank had no program, no service plan, and no written warnings. By every measure anybody ever asked us to report, Hank's approach worked. We were humiliated.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHorace swore he wasn't going to die in a hospital. He'd quietly made Tallulah, another client, his medical power of attorney. When the doctor wouldn't listen to Tallulah, I came in and said exactly what she'd been saying. Afterward she told me, \"You came in and said it in white-man syntax and suddenly we had a care plan.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHorace died where he wanted to die.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eSovereign Territory\u003c\/strong\u003e is one of ten Sagebrush City books. Read them in any order.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEbook (epub), delivered right after purchase.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eIncluded free:\u003c\/strong\u003e Jukebox, a short bonus Sagebrush City book.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Reality Services Office","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54152586723512,"sku":null,"price":9.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0978\/4459\/2824\/files\/Sovereign_Territory_1500x1200T.png?v=1790882450"},{"product_id":"afterhours","title":"After Hours","description":"\u003cp\u003eI worked crisis in Sagebrush City, a desert city in the Southwest. After five, the county stopped calling, and the office belonged to the six of us who never went home.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe names have been changed, and so have a lot of the details, to protect everyone, including me.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFood showed up without anybody planning it. Somebody brought tacos. A grocery-store chicken appeared, and nobody knew who'd bought the chicken. Cajun Jerry told stories with one shoe off. Six adults who'd spent the day on psychosis, eviction, jail, and missing children argued for forty minutes about mayonnaise.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWe could handle suicides. Psychosis. Violence. Death. Children in danger. Government agencies.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWe could not handle the phone ringing at 8:47 when the coats were already involved.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSomebody answered every time. Even Jerry put his shoe back on.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA client named Darryl wanted a second bus pass. He was entitled to one. Six of us each told Darryl one small lie, separately, so nobody had to spend five minutes explaining why he couldn't have two. By the end of the day, the lies added up to a county anti-fraud program with serial-number tracking, audits, and a twenty-four-hour clearance period. None of the programs existed.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eDarryl never got the second pass. He did get six of us to invent a government.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe county would pay to cremate a poor person who died. The county would not pay for a funeral, an urn, or a plot. If nobody picked up the ashes within thirty days, the free cremation started piling up fees.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSo we picked up the ashes. Sometimes the ashes came in cardboard. Once they came in a tub like the ones powdered lemonade comes in, and Frank stopped drinking powdered lemonade for nearly a week.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe county knew legal names. We knew Fatback Ferguson. Little Mike. Church Lady.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eAfter Hours\u003c\/strong\u003e is one of ten Sagebrush City books. Read them in any order.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEbook (epub), delivered right after purchase.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eIncluded free:\u003c\/strong\u003e Jukebox, a short bonus Sagebrush City book.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Reality Services Office","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54152586920120,"sku":null,"price":9.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0978\/4459\/2824\/files\/After_Hours_1500x1200T.png?v=1790882450"},{"product_id":"outlawsrecognizeeachother","title":"Outlaws Recognize Each Other","description":"\u003cp\u003eI worked crisis in Sagebrush City, a desert city in the Southwest. The people the respectable world had written off could pick each other out of a crowd in seconds.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe names have been changed, and so have a lot of the details, to protect everyone, including me.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTallulah, one of our clients, didn't hand out approval easily. She once decided a caseworker was \"too beige to carry news.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThen Nicky came into the office. Nicky was small, and he moved like a man whose body had lost a few negotiations with force. Tallulah looked him up and down.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"You look like you been through something industrial.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNicky grinned. \"Explosive.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTallulah laughed, and they were friends from that moment on.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWallace T. Fink walked a horse down the sidewalk to our office, past the nail salon and the tax preparer. He tied the horse to the railing out front and came inside.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"I only need you to hold Bishop for a little while.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThen Wallace walked across the parking lot and left.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhen Wallace finally came back, he told us why he'd picked our office. \"I still knew you were the safest place.\" Then he sat down with an ordinary problem, probably housing or benefits, and we went to work on Wallace's ordinary problem.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFor years afterward, whenever a client asked us to hold something for a little while, we asked one question first: \"Does it eat?\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOutlaws recognize each other. Recognition means: I know what kind of world made you careful.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eOutlaws Recognize Each Other \u003c\/strong\u003eis one of ten Sagebrush City books. Read them in any order.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEbook (epub), delivered right after purchase.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eIncluded free:\u003c\/strong\u003e Jukebox, a short bonus Sagebrush City book.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Reality Services Office","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54152593309880,"sku":null,"price":9.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0978\/4459\/2824\/files\/Outlaws_Recognize_1500x1200T.png?v=1790882448"},{"product_id":"proofthatyouexist","title":"Proof That You Exist","description":"\u003cp\u003eI worked crisis in Sagebrush City, a desert city in the Southwest. Half the job was proving to the county that our clients existed.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe names have been changed, and so have a lot of the details, to protect everyone, including me.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAt the county benefits office, you brought a birth certificate, a Social Security card, proof of residence, proof of income, proof of no income, and proof the proof hadn't expired. The worker would look at the stack and say you were missing verification.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOf what?\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"It doesn't say.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe benefits office ran on a rule nobody ever wrote down: if you ask for enough documents, some people will disappear. We tried not to let ours disappear.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWe also went to the wrong funeral. Five of us showed up for our client Calvin, and a woman with a box of programs saw us and said, \"Oh, thank God. We're short chairs in the family room.\" So we carried chairs. Jerry hauled a coffee urn. Tallulah found the kitchen and came back eating chicken.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThen somebody read the program. The dead man was Walter Henderson, a deacon with thirty-one years at the county sanitation department. Calvin was in the other chapel.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFor months afterward, Cajun Jerry kept Walter's program in his truck.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"You never met him alive,\" I said.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"Don't mean he wasn't good.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eProof That You Exist \u003c\/strong\u003eis one of ten Sagebrush City books. Read them in any order.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEbook (epub), delivered right after purchase.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eIncluded free:\u003c\/strong\u003e Jukebox, a short bonus Sagebrush City book.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Reality Services Office","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54152599699640,"sku":null,"price":9.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0978\/4459\/2824\/files\/Proof_That_You_1500x1200T.png?v=1790882449"},{"product_id":"somethingisallweget","title":"Something Is All We Get","description":"\u003cp\u003eI worked crisis in Sagebrush City, a desert city in the Southwest. Almost nobody got saved. Some people got a good afternoon.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe names have been changed, and so have a lot of the details, to protect everyone, including me.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEvery win at the office got the Cabbage Patch. A client got housing: Cabbage Patch. A landlord called back: a restrained Cabbage Patch. A county worker admitted we were right: full Cabbage Patch, possibly with travel. Nobody was allowed to get good at the dance.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA client asked us to help pick his rap name. We declined, because rap names were outside our professional scope. Then we named about forty other people.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOn paper, one young mother's name was CLIENT DECLINED TO GIVE LEGAL NAME. The phrase means somebody in charge asked once and never asked again. The neighborhood called her something worse. In my head, I called her Lani, the way her mother had.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI looked for her for three weeks, between other people's emergencies. I found her at a laundromat in a run-down strip mall, in a fake fur jacket with bald spots, washing worn shirts and tiny socks. Her little boy, Dante, was asleep in his stroller with a bag of chips in his hand.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThere was no miracle. No housing placement. The next day there was another case.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFor one afternoon, I saw her. One afternoon isn't enough. One afternoon is still something.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSome days, something is all we get.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eSomething Is All We Get\u003c\/strong\u003e is one of ten Sagebrush City books. Read them in any order.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEbook (epub), delivered right after purchase.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eIncluded free: \u003c\/strong\u003eJukebox, a short bonus Sagebrush City book.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Reality Services Office","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54152599896248,"sku":null,"price":9.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0978\/4459\/2824\/files\/Something_is_All_1500x1200T.png?v=1790882451"},{"product_id":"permanentresidents","title":"Permanent Residents","description":"\u003cp\u003eYou don't need a ticket to Burning Man to meet a man in a top hat, a thong, and flip-flops. You need a slow Tuesday morning at a crisis office in Sagebrush City, a desert city in the Southwest.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe said he was there for his appointment.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe names have been changed, and so have a lot of the details, to protect everyone, including me.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSome clients become permanent residents in your head. They moved in without asking, and now I pay rent to them in the form of sentences.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEvery few months, the coroner's office called and asked if I could come take a look. A near-photographic memory makes you the person the coroner calls to put a name to a body. The room was always too bright. The body was always somebody I hoped I wouldn't recognize. Usually I did.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA tiny old woman on home care watched her aide's boyfriend follow the aide to work and start beating her inside the old woman's house. The old woman picked up a frying pan. By the time I got there, the boyfriend was in the back of the police truck. The old woman was still holding the dented frying pan, and she wasn't about to apologize.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA twelve-year-old explained, calmly, how to burn only part of a house so the fire looks like an electrical accident. His therapist quit after two sessions because he took notes on her wiring.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePermanent Residents\u003c\/strong\u003e is one of ten Sagebrush City books. Read them in any order.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEbook (epub), delivered right after purchase.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eIncluded free:\u003c\/strong\u003e Jukebox, a short bonus Sagebrush City book.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Reality Services Office","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54152599929016,"sku":null,"price":9.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0978\/4459\/2824\/files\/Permanent_Residents_1500x1200T.png?v=1790882448"},{"product_id":"faultlines","title":"Fault Lines","description":"\u003cp\u003eI worked crisis in Sagebrush City, a desert city in the Southwest. The earthquake hit at 4:17 in the morning, an hour when everybody is either asleep, committing a felony, or eating shredded cheese over the sink.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe names have been changed, and so have a lot of the details, to protect everyone, including me.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe power went out. The office phones went dead. The cops weren't answering, and the ambulances weren't coming.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSomewhere in the city were people no evacuation plan had remembered, because nobody had admitted they existed.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFrank pulled into the office lot in his ancient Buick. Cajun Jerry showed up wearing one leather glove, with bottled water, blankets, three crowbars, and a chainsaw in the bed of his truck. Tallulah arrived in a city maintenance truck nobody had issued her, wearing a city hard hat and a vest that said INCIDENT COMMANDER.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSo we went looking. We pulled people out of damaged apartments, flooded camps, cracked motels, parking structures, abandoned houses, and places nobody had realized anybody lived.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWe took twelve people to a shelter in the bed of Jerry's pickup, under a tarp that said HAPPY RETIREMENT, COACH DAVE.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFault Lines is also about leaving. One of us married a nice, wealthy man who wanted her out of the trenches. The side diamonds on her ring looked like '80s headlights. We told her to go, and we meant it.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe book ends with my own answers to two questions: would I do the work again, and why did I stop?\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFault Lines\u003c\/strong\u003e is one of ten Sagebrush City books. Read them in any order.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEbook (epub), delivered right after purchase.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eIncluded free: \u003c\/strong\u003eJukebox, a short bonus Sagebrush City book.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Reality Services Office","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54152600060088,"sku":null,"price":9.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0978\/4459\/2824\/files\/Fault_Lines_1500x1200T.png?v=1790882451"},{"product_id":"thehumanpart","title":"The Human Part","description":"\u003cp\u003eI worked crisis in Sagebrush City, a desert city in the Southwest. I brought my professional brain to work every day. My clients kept going around it.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe names have been changed, and so have a lot of the details, to protect everyone, including me.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eKorey, one of my clients, showed up with his phone, one earbud, and instructions. \"Left ear. Not right. You need the left so it gets straight to your feelings.\" He'd found a Warren Zevon song the night before, and he needed somebody to hear the song with him.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"This song ain't for your professional brain,\" Korey told me. \"This is for the human part.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhen the song ended, Korey said, \"You know what scares me? Not dying. Nobody cares about dying. Happens all the time. What scares me is disappearing.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAn old champion boxer with dementia kept swinging at caregivers he didn't recognize. Another home-care agency had already quit. So our home-care business sent men in sweats who called him Coach and said they'd come to train. They cooked because fighters have to eat right. They handed him his pills because a fighter has to stay sharp.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe stayed in his own house, with his own photographs and his own chair. We didn't cure anything. We found a door his mind would still open, and we sent good people through the door.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOur clients had big plans. A food truck. A Christian motorcycle ministry. One man planned to become a dolphin trainer. We lived in the desert.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNobody lacked ambition. They lacked Tuesday.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSuccess usually meant the catastrophe had been delayed long enough to lose momentum. Every now and then, a client put together three Tuesdays in a row.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe Human Part\u003c\/strong\u003e is one of ten Sagebrush City books. Read them in any order.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEbook (epub), delivered right after purchase.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eIncluded free: \u003c\/strong\u003eJukebox, a short bonus Sagebrush City book.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Reality Services Office","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54152600387768,"sku":null,"price":9.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0978\/4459\/2824\/files\/The_Human_Part_1500x1200T.png?v=1790882451"},{"product_id":"entire-sagebrush-city-series","title":"Entire Sagebrush City collection","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe Sagebrush City collectionL Entire Sagebrush City series (10 ebooks)\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThese stories are true.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003eThe\u003c\/span\u003e names have been changed. \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003eThe\u003c\/span\u003e details have been reworked. \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003eThe \u003c\/span\u003epeople remain unmistakably themselves.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFor years, a small human-services company in Sagebrush City tried to help people whose lives rarely fit inside \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e boxes provided for them.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003eThe\u003c\/span\u003e clients were known as \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e Finks.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003eThe\u003c\/span\u003e employees were \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e Henches.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNeither term was official.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eVery little that mattered was.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003eThe\u003c\/span\u003e Finks arrived with benefit notices, housing disasters, street debts, medical emergencies, family wars, improbable business plans and questions no professional training had anticipated. One wanted \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe \u003c\/span\u003eoffice to settle a forty-dollar dispute involving several different categories of money. Another robbed a restaurant of exactly one cherry\u003cbr\u003epie. Darryl asked six employees for \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e same extra bus pass and received six independently invented lies.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eKorey treated bus schedules as prophecy, nutrition as theology and public-access television as an opportunity nobody had been wise enough to deny him.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTallulah moved through Sagebrush City with a street name, a government name, a talent for identifying \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e truth sideways and enough chaos to alter \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e working conditions of everyone nearby.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAround them were caseworkers, supervisors, landlords, judges, police officers, benefits departments, hospitals and government systems capable of transforming hunger into “Nutritional Access Optimization” without once mentioning food.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003eThe\u003c\/span\u003e work could be dangerous.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt could be ridiculous.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrequently, it was both before lunch.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAcross ten books, these memoirs follow \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e Finks and Henches through \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e daily life of Sagebrush City, and follow \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e author through \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe \u003c\/span\u003epeople, places, music, family memories and losses that remained after \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e office closed.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSome stories are about \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e things people did to survive.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSome are about \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e systems that made survival unnecessarily complicated.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSome are about a song, a funeral, an earthquake, an office snack bowl or a dead friend who still occupies space in \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e structure of \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003eworld\u003c\/span\u003e.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThey are funny because \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e people were funny.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThey are painful because \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e people were real.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd beneath \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e bad decisions, bureaucratic language, street logic and professional improvisation is \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e part no form ever managed to capture: \u003cspan class=\"il\"\u003ethe\u003c\/span\u003e human part.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Reality Services Office","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54152656814264,"sku":null,"price":36.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0978\/4459\/2824\/files\/All_10_books_1500x1200T_2.png?v=1790882451"}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0978\/4459\/2824\/collections\/SGB2_icon_2.png?v=1790874117","url":"https:\/\/realityservicesoffice.com\/collections\/sagebrushcity.oembed","provider":"Reality Services Office","version":"1.0","type":"link"}