There is one thing for sure in prison- you have a lot of TIME. Time consumes you in here. There is not one single day that goes by that a fellow inmate isn’t talking about how long they have been “down” (meaning how long they have been in prison), and how much time they have left.
One recurring theme in this prison is the fact our time isn’t calculated properly. FSA credit and SCA credit is not applied properly for anyone here. There is a savvy inmate here, who completely understands how to apply FSA and SCA credits, and we all go to her for our true “date” as it isn’t applied by the prison itself. There have been numerous people here much longer than they are supposed to, due to these dates being wrong. Our FSA and SCA credits are not frontloaded, therefore, halfway houses and releases are delayed for everyone. I too, am having this issue, and addressed it with the Unit Team.
Serving time in a federal prison can make or break you. You are taken away from your family and those you love, and placed in a whole new world. There aren’t a lot of jobs offered at this prison, as there isn’t a budget for everyone to have a job at this “working prison”, and there are not FSA classes readily offered here either, so you have to find things to keep you busy. Unfortunately, there is a large drug problem here, so many inmates get high in the evenings and sleep away the mornings to make the time pass faster. I decided to take a different route, and involved myself heavily in church, teaching bible study classes and offering support for people who need help writing letters for their cases and discrepancies in their sentences. Fortunately, there is some sort of bible study here every day, and choir, so it helps pass the time. There is also a library here that I have worked my way through, author by author, and a dog program that is a nice distraction.
Even with those few distractions, there is still plenty of time on your hands. I have a goal to try to really figure out the problem with our FSA credits and SCA credits not being applied properly, and helping my fellow inmates with their post-prison plans. Everything in life is either a blessing or lesson, and I am choosing my time in prison to be both.
