November 27, 2023
Thanksgiving has come and gone and as it stands, the next one will be at the Camp. Things are getting real, and the value of preparation is glaring. I went to see my son’s band play at the Stone Church in Brattleboro on Saturday night. I’m going to miss the pause of several months before I get to see him play again. I’m grateful for the extra time granted to surrender.
This morning I attended a pre operation seminar on joint replacement at the hospital in preparation for my surgery in two days. The room had about 12 others that were mostly advanced in age by comparison. I don’t see myself as a part of this age bracket, but the constant pain is real. The MRI results confirmed Moderate Degenerative Disease in both hips as well as the L4 and L5 of the spine.
I just see myself in a few months free of hip pain, sleeping at night and moving on to other things that matter. The last few days I have been unable to walk without feeling debilitating pain. I do not take pain medication other than Advil or Tylenol which does very little if anything. Back brace helps.
Today I read the stories of Halim Flowers, Adam Clausen and Tommy Walker on this platform. Their individual stories are inspiring and remarkable. It confirms that life is about choices. Having a vision for hope when it seems hopeless and never losing sight of the end goal is what Stuck with me most. To condense 20-plus years in prison into seven or eight paragraphs does not even begin to tell of their experience. It also made me realize that my time in the camp should be a year or maybe even less. When I applied RDAP credits to the sentence calculator it made no difference in the Time served because of the available First Step Act credits. I will take every available course and take advantage of every possible course to earn credits for The earliest possible release to home confinement. I also feel cheated (a bit) as someone with A slightly longer sentence of a few months may receive RDAP credits and end up serving less time than I will with a lesser sentence. I’ll do a few real time scenarios into the upcoming sentence calculator once it goes live.
