Journal 4
Hand cuffs
Three week lockdown to the unit. Work detail is able to go to work, but otherwise, all men are restricted to the unit. Store restriction limited to $50 per month, two -five-minute phone calls per day, and no tv. The day after the Super Bowl is when the restrictions are lifted. All sorts of contraband found, dirty drug tests, more than 30 men went to the SHU, so far. More men are expected to go.
Do I complain? No, Does no good. Do I wish it would not happen? Of course, I wish it wouldn’t, but I have no control over what other people do. The best I can do is try to lead by being an example. People don’t change overnight from lifelong habits of doing wrong, or at least I didn’t. It takes persistence and perseverance to change after living life wrong for so long.
My first few years in prison I was in two different low-security prisons. Thank G-d I didn’t have to experience any deeper into the prison system. But while at these ‘lows’ I felt somewhat protected from the outside world. The world of freedom to do as I chose, the world which I knew no boundaries. No boundaries to keep me in line of doing wrong in my world of addictions. I heard of the place where I’m at now, off the chain, ‘ wide open’ is the term in prison. To do, and get, what a man wanted. I didn’t want to go here, Why? Fear. Because I felt fearful for what might happen, what I might do. That is, fall back into my addictions, and into my old ways.
About 17 years before coming to prison I landed myself on probation for a two year period. While on probation I tried hard to change, but I struggled terribly at the same time. My addictions and my way of life had a very strong hold on me. I messed up a couple of times by dropping dirty drug test. I was really trying to do good. I feared the day my probation ended, Why ? Because I feared what I might do,fall back into my addictions. I did heavily, I did exactly what I feared. I had no boundaries set, I had no end in mind of where I wanted to go . I had learned nothing those two years of probation. I lived those two years in fear of messing up, and I did in the end. I didn’t learn how to wear my own handcuffs.
I was finally designated for a transfer, but not where I wanted to go. I was going to where I feared of going. The transfer took six weeks to go one hundred miles away. Three weeks in USP Terra Haute (a story in itself) and three weeks in MCC Chicago(another story of its own). But during those six weeks I convinced myself that where I was going would be the best place for me. Why? So I could learn how to wear my own handcuffs, to test my boundaries of doing right. I told myself if I can’t make it here then how was I expecting to make it on the streets. I had to be strong, I have to keep ‘why’ I’m doing for the reasons I’m doing in the forefront of everything else. To keep the end in mind always. I have purpose in my life now, I’ve discovered so much about myself as a person. I love who I am. I know who I am because I wanted to know why I am, and the way I was all my life. I want to live a life I have never experienced before, with my wife, children, grandchildren, and now, great grandchildren. For these reasons and many more reasons, I wear my shiny new handcuffs everyday. I love my handcuffs because I look so good with them on. 🙂
I have a purpose in life, I can be an example.
