I woke up this morning thanking God I did not have to wake up during the night to use the toilet, and was able to sleep through the whole night, until they unlocked the doors at 05:30 and the noise began. I had my callout for medical to do lab work, which seemed weird since I had lab work done two days ago. At 09:00 I went to medical and they told me the callout was a mistake so I head back to the unit and wait for lunch.
Once I get back to the unit, I find out that Mr. Gibson’s roommate and him are not getting along. Mr. Gibson seems to have some sort of dementia, and no one has patience around here to help him. I take a few deep breaths and I head into his room, ask how he is doing, and he doesn’t seem to be in good shape. He asks if I could help him find some medication in his locker, and the minute I open his locker, I ask him to move to another chair, and empty out his locker and start organizing everything for him, my OCD kicked in. Both top shelves I place the food items, all by size, type, and expiration date. I wipe down each and every shelf, and continue to organize everything else he has. I threw away so much that he did not need, all with his approval first, though I did kind of push that he through it out. I organized all his medications for him, and he gifted me two of his soap dishes, because apparently he did not need all 8 that he has. Now these extra soap dishes I will put aside in a bag I have with extra items that I could gift to any newcomers that come in empty handed. I finish cleaning and organizing Mr. Gibson’s locker and all his items just in time to go get Mr. Rivero and his wheelchair to head to lunch. Mr. Gibson thanked me several times and I headed out.
After lunch, as I am pushing Mr. Rivero back to the unit, we were neck-and-neck with Mr. Campos and his wheelchair driver, Mr. Escudero. As we are approaching the unit, from afar I see my chaplain about to enter the unit and I shout for her. She turns and heads towards me, and says, “Let’s go, I need you in the Chapel, Flagler unit is in there and I am sure they have made a mess”. Oh no I thought, “Chaplain, let me drop off Mr. Rivero and I will be right there”. When I leave the unit, Mr. Escudero accompanies me, and the Chaplain is still waiting to walk with me over to the Chapel, and as we arrive I can see everyone in the Chapel looking at us. The educators and the inmates are all there waiting for me. The Chaplain realizes several things out of place, and asks me why they are that way, and it is because whatever was holding those things in place are no longer there. This caused that all inmates from that unit that were in the Chapel, get searched on their way out, I felt so bad, but there was no reason for anything to go missing in the Chapel.
Once everyone was gone, I setup Mr. Escudero with a movie in the personal televisions, and I sweeped the Chapel up from front to back.
At 13:00 Rabbi Katz, the volunteer for the Jewish community arrived and spent one hour with some of the Jews. I sat with Mr. Escudero to watch “The Ten Commandments” with him while we waited.
After the 4pm count, I told Mr. Rivero I was not going to the dining room, he was okay with it, so I went to “rec”. My “Diabetes and You” class was canceled today so I continued over to the racquetball court and played for an hour, then went over to the barbershop at 6 to clean up my hair for visit this weekend, then walked a few laps with a buddy of mine, then headed back to the unit at the 8pm move.
I prepared a pouch of tuna, with salted roasted peanuts, some seasonings, spices, and ate that as my dinner/snack. Called my mom, showered, and sitting here finishing this journal. Tomorrow is a busy day.
Thank you God for this day and everything you continue helping me with. I am grateful for your guidance and getting me to where I am now in my life, allowing me this chance to prepare for a better future.
