"Denver has always been a city of blatant contrasts, a place where some neighborhoods are cooled by tree-lined canopies while others simmer in concrete-cracking heat. Gurule's book showcases the even deeper division between affluent citizens and the people who labor to make ends meet. Everyone in her apartment is touched by economic injustice: Her parents understand they will work until they die, and Gurule strips at night at a local club to bolster what she earns working at Whole Foods."
"So when a lonely older man named John offers to pay her an entire dancing shift's earnings for one conversation over dinner, she says yes. And when steakhouse chitchat quickly progresses to more, Gurule veers down a path toward financial relief, lodging herself in the rich and storied tradition of sex work in Denver. She writes, "I lived in a world that saw my body, sex with my body specifically, as bartering gold.""
Michelle Gurule struggled with medical debt, student loans, and the responsibility of supporting three generations in a two-bedroom Denver apartment. She worked at Whole Foods by day and stripped at a local club by night to supplement income and cover family expenses. Economic divisions left some Denver neighborhoods cooled by trees while others simmered in heat. A lonely older man named John offered to pay an entire dancing shift's earnings for dinner, which led to further exchanges and a turn toward paid sexual relationships. Sex work in Denver has deep roots going back to the late 1800s, when Market Street served miners through parlors run by businesswomen.
Read at High Country News
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