It has been a roller coaster of a week. But today, Friday April 4, 2025, is the end of our week. Up early, I have an 8:30am callout to pick up medical records.
Mr. Rivero is also been waiting for medical records, so I ask him to come with me in case they have his ready. We are dressed and ready to go, both have already had our morning cafecito.
We take the 8am move over to the medical records area, and I am first to walk in. I am handed a set of papers, and asked to sign a document that I received my records. I ask if Mr. Rivero’s are ready, and mention he has been requesting them for nearly a month, but they are not ready yet. As we step out, thankfully someone stopped us to say hello and I took a look at the records in my hands. They are not mine!
I head back in and let them know the situation we are in, and I am asked to have a seat for a few minutes. I am called in, and I wait as the records are printing; they are handed to me, and I head back to my unit.
I sit down in my room to go through them, make sure they are organized, and I hear our case manager yelling to stand by for inspections, so I rush to put everything away as he walks by checking each room. As he completes his walkthrough, they call the 9am move and I head to Dolphin unit to see my new supervisor. As I head into that unit, I find his office door locked, and I head out of the unit to head towards the Education department, and I see him walking towards his unit. I stop to talk with him, and we agree to meet after lunch. I mentioned I would be in the unit or in Education, and we each go our ways.
I get back to the unit and sit down in my room to read my daily devotionals with a cafecito in hand.
Today from the “Jesus First for Men 365 Devotions to Start Your Day”, it brings to us a great message.
“All hard work brings a profit, but mere talk leads only to poverty”
[Proverbs 14:23]
Same as “Colossians 3:23”, work had for God not for man. I work hard to always get the best out of it, whether it be experience, and/or building our character, and in the end always “blessed with the honor of growing in resilience, fortitude, and strength”. This word was perfect, as it gives me even more of a push to work hard in the new work detail that I know great things will come from it.
As we wait for lunch, I sit to talk with Mr. Rivero. Today lunch was called on time, and the menu shows for breaded fish. Mr. Rivero is loaded into his wheelchair and we head to the dining room. Being Friday, there is a large group of staff over by the dining room and several officers standing by to do their pat searches. Nearing the chow hall, I notice Chaplain Hostler and I wave over to him, saying hello. Inside the dining room, I grab both trays and hand them down to Mr. Rivero, then wheel him over to the tables; he sets down the trays, I wait for him to stand so I could fold away his chair, and I walk over to the water machine to fill two cups for us.
I sit down to eat, and he has the face of a young child looking at broccoli that his parents served him. Good thing for us both, I am not going to force him to eat his food, or punish him for not eating. HAHA.
He uses his spork to move his fish patty over to my tray, where I use the provided tartar sauce packets to top the patties and eat them both without bread, to keep the carbs down somewhat, then I eat the coleslaw and once I finish, I take both trays over to the dish room window, then return to get his wheelchair ready for him and begin wheeling him out of the dining room.
As we stroll our way back to the unit, we take in the fresh air and nice breeze that is flowing on the compound. Once back in the unit, I only had enough time to drop off Mr. Rivero as the afternoon work call move was called.
I recently started working for the Re-Entry Affairs Coordinator. He was recently promoted from his counselor position, as the previous coordinator retired and the position has been vacant for a few months. I head to the Education department along with Mr. Garcia and Mr. Aquino, and in the distance I see Mr. Nicholas, our Re-Entry Affairs Coordinator, but I see him go past a gate I am not able to go, so I continue towards Education.
1pm, he did not come by so I took the move over to my unit, and as soon as I walk in, one guy tells me Mr. Nicholas was just here looking for me. I head up the stairs to my case managers office, and find my counselor who tells me Mr. Nicholas was looking for me. Oh my goodness, we really need trackers or beepers around here. I quickly head out of the unit to look for him, past medical and down the small slope. As I start reaching the first turn, I look back and see Mr. Nicholas by the Lieutenants office walking towards the chapel; I quickly turn around and head back towards the chapel area. He sees me and I walk over to him, where we then walk over to Education to have a look at what is going to be his new space.
Once in Education, we walk to the rear and find the Re-Entry room full of old desks, files and junk that needs to be either thrown away, organized or taken by other departments. We find a lockbox that needs to be taken to the chapel, so we close up and make our way over to the chapel where we meet with Chaplain Hostler. After talking things through, Mr. Nicholas looks over to me and asks, “There is potential in fixing up that office space right?”
I respond, “Most definitely! I am going to do whatever I can to help make the Re-Entry Department the best in the compound.” I look over to the Chaplain and tell him, “Sorry chaplain, I tried to do that here but…”
Chaplain responds, “I know you will, even with the new guys we hired here, I just told them to TRY and follow everything you were doing, even though I know they will never have this chapel organized and functioning the way you did”.
Me: “Thank you Chaplain”
Mr. Nicholas: “Sounds great, I can’t wait for us to start it up, let’s get going, I have a few things to do before ending my week.”
As we head out of the chapel, we talk over a few things; Mr. Nicholas heads back to his office, and I head back to my unit.
Back in my unit, I head to my room, change into my comfortable clothes and lay down. As count comes around, I stand up as we are asked to do and then I lay back down. As of yesterday my body has been feeling like shutting down, and last night I was able to fall asleep quickly but I must not sleep well because today I was even more tired. I shut my eyes and slept until 6:30, where I got out of bed to find a bowl of food on my table. As I get out of bed, Mr. Rivero walks towards my room, and tells me he left me some food there for me, since what Mr. Campos served him was too much. The food is not hot, but its not too cold, I add some mayonnaise and bacon bits to it and I eat what there is. As I am eating, Mr. Rivero comes over and hands me a half of “Sugar Free” soda, as he made it very clear it was sugar free. When I finish I go wash the bowl and fork, then return to my room to put things away and grab my stuff to shower.
In and out quickly, I am refreshed from the shower, and I head to the phone to call dad. Again I did not check how much money I had in the phone account and I was only able to talk to him for 2 minutes. This won’t happen to me anymore, I will check daily.
I head to my room and fill a small bowl with Cool Ranch Doritos, grab my tablet with headphones and head to my chair next to my roommate and watch television. It is then I realize, it is past the time I usually call mom, and I set my things down on the chair and head to the phones again.
Mom is good, and they are having pizza at the house. This ends the day for me, it is one day more but it is also one day less. I pray Father God for good things, I pray that whatever plans You have for my life includes being home soon with my family. I ask Dear Lord for Your mercy and grace to allow me a chance to start my life over in the free world. Thank you Father for watching over and taking care of my family. I pray for a safe and healthy weekend for everyone. Amen.
Eduardo Luis Valdes
02499-506
April 4, 2025
21:22
