Day two consecutively that I have woken up at 5:35am and gone to food service for breakfast. I will say it does help me keep my spirits up, and allows me more time to handle my things throughout the day.
Today I started my “K2 Awareness” class in education, there are over fifteen students all together. The instructor is the counselor out of Dolphin unit, first time I get to meet him. The course will be a total of five weeks, every Friday at 8am. I have never “done” K2, but have seen what it does to others, and after reading through the booklet today, certifies that I will continue to stay away from it.
Lunch time, I wheel Mr. Rivero over to food service, we must have taken the fast lane because we were the first to arrive at the “chow hall”. I grab both trays and hand them to Mr. Rivero and we go grab a seat at a table. Luckily he doesn’t eat the breaded fish, so when I returned from getting our cups with water and ice, I see I have two breaded fish on my tray, lucky me. After lunch, we head back to the dorm and the compound closes so no further movements. I walk into the open dorm area called the “glass house”, and through the corner of my eye I see one of the bathroom stall doors wide open and someone’s knees as seem to be sitting on the toilet, and as I continue walking past Mr. Gibson’s room I notice he is not there, and that must have been him on the toilet. If I have not mentioned before, Mr. Gibson is a 79 year old man, who has been incarcerated for over two decades, and at times forgets what he does, has done, or where he is. I see that there was a dark liquid on the floor of his room and I realize what it is and know something is wrong. I head to the bathroom and Mr. Gibson is walks out towards me, wearing nothing but his uniform shirt and boxers. Something is most definitely wrong, “Mr. Gibson”, I tell him, “are you okay?” to which he replied, “I don’t know”, I told him we need to contact someone, and I went looking for the officer. The officer comes over, sees the condition Mr. Gibson is in and calls medical. Not to toot my own horn, but thank God they closed the compound and I came across this situation, because I probably saved his life. We come to find out that Mr. Gibson has been taking too many blood pressure medication pills and his blood pressure dropped drastically.
Now I am ready to head to the chapel, but still the compound is closed, luckily, the unit manager comes into the dorm to do a few things, and upon him walking towards the exit, I ask him if he could walk me to the chapel so I could get to work preparing for the afternoon services and he does.
We get locked in for the 4pm count, and I decide that since I am not going to dinner chow, I am going to make a famous “Soup Sandwich” which included:
1 – Square Cajun Soup (warmed enough in hot water to separate into two squares)
Once spread on the table, I added some of the seasoning, mayonnaise, garlic powder, one Spam, garlic plantain chips, and some jalapeno wheels.
I then added some seasoning to both sides of the “sandwich” and enjoyed. Thank you “Nica” for these ideas.
Count clears, I call my dad and wait for the rec move, and head to the chapel, prepare for the Jewish services, and assist the Chaplain with whatever was needed.
I’m back in the dorm, showered, called mom, tomorrow is visit day, here I am, with my water bottle and some peanuts, typing this journal, its 9pm, time to go. Have a good night.
Thank you God for all you do and another great day even though I am where I am, I know in the end it will all be worth it somehow.
