My Young Friend

There’s a young black man in here who goes home on December 31^st. He’s a good kid. That may be an overstatement. See, “good” in here – I realized some time ago – isn’t the same thing as “good” outside the fence. Good means he’s not conning anyone, or bullying or extorting anyone. Good means he avoids trouble, steers clear of the gangs, and the drugs, and the stupid racial animus that grips so much of day to day living in here. It’s not really a high bar that’s set, but somehow he manages.

And I like the kid. I really like him. He was a decent high school athlete – good enough that a couple of Division 1 football programs offered him scholarships. He turned them down, joined the army, and two years later – with his girlfriend pregnant – got busted with drugs and two stolen guns. He found himself out of the army and in prison. I’ve learned these past five years that his story is typical of so many other young black men in prison. Perhaps that’s what’s weighing on me as I see him get close to release. He’s coming back. I hate saying it, but it’s as true as the sun rising in the east. He’s coming back.

How do I know? You can see it in their faces, hear it in their voices. Show me a guy who wants to be liked by the numbskulls, who tells you he’s a “grown ass man” yet insists on following every other guy’s lead, and I can almost guarantee a return trip to corrections. Here’s the thing about so many of the young black guys I meet in here: They crave fitting in. every expression, every mannerism is a repeat of ten other guys. They all want to look the same, act the same, be the same.

I kind of understand it. Prison spends a great deal of time seeking uniformity. What you can wear, what you can buy, even what you can listen to and read is regulated. Grooming policies limit hair length. You act too much like an individual and you end up on the administration’s radar, and that’s usually not a good place to be.

So guys try and lay low.  It’s easier running hustles and ignoring the rules when you’re with a pack. But, you can’t find your way in a group. You can’t face your demons when they’re all around you. And, demons are what bring you back in here.

He’s a good kid, and he loves his little boy. I’ve seen them together in the visitation room.  His son, on his way to five, jumps in his lap when he arrives. The boy never leaves his dad’s side. “You’ll be home soon,” the little boy tells him. I watch them and remember how it was when both my boys were that age, how I’d wrestle with them, and chase them, and I’d let them climb all over me. I watch them and remind myself, the little boy is just a visitor, a visitor in prison.

“I’m going home to be a good dad and never coming back,” he tells me. He sounds sincere. Funny, that’s his name, “Sincere.” See, he runs with the five percenters and they name you after an “attribute.” That’s how guys run around here calling each other “Magnetic,” or “Dominance,” or “Viscous.” Problem is, calling yourself something doesn’t make it so. That’s just one in a series of problems with the philosophical underpinnings of the “5%ers.”

He says he’s going in a different direction, but what he says doesn’t match what he does. He has an overwhelming need to be accepted. “I’m the most popular guy on the east side,” he told me one day. I told him being popular in prison, with guys who see this bid as just a fieldstone on their path of criminal activity, isn’t what you want. See, to get along with the crowd in here requires you to ignore that little voice inside which keeps saying over and over, “I’m going the wrong way.” And, my young friend doesn’t get that.

Male children of incarcerated black adult males are four times as likely to be incarcerated as little black boys whose fathers haven’t been to prison. That is an ugly fact. But, it should tell young black fathers in here how important it is for them to break the cycle. No father wants his son to experience this.

So “Sincere” is sincere when he says “I’m gonna be a good dad. My son won’t go through this.” Yet, there he was last week, getting fresh ink done in his cut. What’s the risk – besides hepatitis or a dozen other diseases? He gets caught and he loses his 30 day adjustment days, plus six more. Thirty-six days. Doesn’t sound like a lot, but everybody in here, every day away from your little boy, is a day you can’t get back.

And then I tell him this. I “knew” the risks behind what I was doing, but I really didn’t. I thought I carefully calculated it all out: no jail time; no divorce; no estrangement from my sons. I rationalized it was all worth the risk; I’d save my marriage; my sons would have everything. I was wrong on all counts. I hadn’t calculated the damage it was doing to me; I completely misread the punishment, and my marriage, and my sons, and how I was solely responsible for the train wreck that became my family, my life.

He doesn’t see it. He’s “Big Man on the Compound.” Prison, I tell him, is no place to want to be successful or liked. Do your time, learn from it, and leave and be the best man you can be. I hope I’m wrong about my young friend. His failure will have repercussions.

 

Back to Blogging, 9/23/2012

My summer sabbatical lasted a few more weeks than I expected, but I’m back, finally ready to let everyone know what life day to day is like.  And it’s been an interesting summer.

Guys from our college program continued to go home.  Most are doing well.  It’s only been nine months since our first graduation, but nineteen have left.  I’m sorry to report two – both men with histories of drug problems – are back in custody. 

But, not all is well with the college program.  Money has dried up.  With the economy continuing its poor recovery and politicians on both sides of the aisle seemingly unable to put their personal opinions behind what’s good for the country, the strain on Federal and State budgets makes it impossible for money to reach where it’s needed most.  The Community College grant which funds this program is set to expire at year end.

Is this a good use of taxpayer money?  Consider that it costs in excess of $25,000 per year to house and maintain one inmate in a Virginia prison.  Consider that the best determining factor in an inmate recommitting a crime upon release is education.  Simply put, incarcerated persons who receive a college education while in prison don’t return to prison after their release.   It’s simple economics really.  Spend $3,000 to $4,000 to educate a man while locked up and virtually guarantee his success as a taxpaying citizen, or spend ten times that amount to keep him in prison.

Most states see the logic in prison reform.  Virginia, unfortunately, does not.  I serve time in a state where our current Governor will announce he believes in “second chances”, yet provides not one dollar in state money to make those second chances a reality.  A private wealthy donor (“The Sunshine Lady” and her foundation) refused to underwrite the college programs in Virginia’s prisons because the state refuses to have any “skin in the game”.  Ironically, she is funding programs in four other states – all with conservative Republican Governors – who willingly match private funds with state dollars.

This summer I was invited to be interviewed by a Voice of America reporter for a broadcast back to China on the humane, “education matters in prison” programs, being utilized in American corrections.  It came on the heels of a Chinese government issued report noting the United States has the largest inmate population in the world and has twenty percent of its children living below the poverty rate.

I also was fortunate enough to be interviewed by the chief legislative aid of retiring Senator Jim Webb (D, Virginia) about prison education.  Senator Webb is one of those rare politicians – like Senator John McCain – who puts country ahead of party.  For the past six years this conservative, decorated war hero has led a tireless campaign for prison reform.  Too many people are behind bars for nonviolent crimes, costing billions and creating generational damage in communities that will reverberate for years.  Senator Webb believes America can do better.  He’s right.

This summer has seen its share of fights – always too many.  I’ve watched as racial tensions have flared as splinter sects “the 5%ers” try and actively recruit newly arrived young black inmates who have known nothing but failure and poverty their whole lives.  For them, for so many on the economic and education fringes of society, the American dream is a cruel lie.

And, I heard about a friend from in here – a guy I’ve written about, “Mouse” who is near death.  Mouse left here in May with both admission to college and a job lined up.  He did ten years and was ready to live, be productive, get his bachelor’s degree and hopefully open his own restaurant.  Three weeks ago Mouse suffered a brain aneurism.  His long term prognosis is doubtful.  I continue to keep Mouse in my prayers.

Prayers.  They work.  I realized this summer that I may never understand why I’m going through what I do, but I know God understands me.  More importantly, He loves me and forgives me.  And no one – no matter their sin – is beyond His grace.

Prisons are full of flesh and blood people; some have done terrible things.  And some would do terrible things again.  But, if you believe in the God the prophet Isaiah spoke about, if you pay attention to the parables and letters of the New Testament, you know there is always hope.  And hope matters, today more than ever.

I have a lot of ideas for the blog.  I have a lot of stories to tell and people to introduce you to.  Each week you’ll get a glimpse of life in here.  Hopefully, you’ll also understand why we must do better.

It’s time for me to get back to work and I’m looking forward to sharing my life in here with you.

Ryan, Magnetic and Others

In an excerpt from the late Steve Jobs recently published autobiography he explains his disagreement with Christianity.  Too many Christians, he suggests, don’t try and live like Christ and follow His teachings and instead focus on tenets of faith and belief.  I think Mr. Jobs may be on to something and it got me thinking about a lot of guys I deal with in here.

Ryan is in the top bunk next to me.  He’s rather short and a workout friend.  He’s built like a hobbit on steroids.  He also is an active practicing “Christian”, or so he describes himself that way.  He is constantly reading Bible commentaries, pouring over King James interpretations of verses, and looking up precise meanings of words from a Bible dictionary he keeps at hand.  He also attends Bible study and services three times a week.  And yet, Ryan is one of the most angry, distrustful, arrogant people I have ever met. 

“I don’t trust any of these scumbags,” Ryan told me the other day.  When I smiled he asked me what was so funny.  “I’m trying to remember where in ‘The Sermon on the Mount’ that line appeared?”  His curt response:  “Jesus doesn’t expect us to put up with a-holes.”  Somehow I think Ryan missed the entire point of the New Testament.

Then, there is “Magnetic”.   He’s a young kid who has become a philosopher.  He knows virtually everything (just ask him).  He’s toying with the “5%ers” philosophy (hence the name “Magnetic”, there is also “Unique”, “Dominion”, and “Sincere”, in the building.  They pick and choose various pieces of each religious philosophy like ordering ala carte at a restaurant).  Magnetic spoke often of “black Friday”, the day in the future when the oppressed masses overthrow the white majority.  “You’ll be fine Larry.  You care about us.”

Magnetic spouts forth Bible verses (and passages from the Koran) to support his logic.  It blew up in his face recently.  The college students (regular program) had intro to sociology.  Magnetic was enrolled in the class.  The Professor had effeminate mannerisms.  Magnetic announced in class that “God hates” homosexuals and therefore, he didn’t have to listen to anything the Professor said.  The instructor left word for the school principal.  “I won’t tolerate ridicule like that.  He’s out.”  The principal concurred and Magnetic was removed from college.  Yesterday he was moved.  Before he left he asked me if I thought he was wrong to try and uphold a “Biblical principle”.

I thought for a moment about my response.  I reminded him I’m in prison for a “theft”.  “Thou shalt not steal.  My marriage – a church marriage – failed miserably.”  So I asked him, who am I to judge whether that instructor is living right?

I think a great deal about the lessons, the requirements of faith, and the more I think about them the more I realize I didn’t know a thing about what God really requires of us.  Over and over I hear the words from the prophet Micah, “What does the Lord require of you?  Do justice, love kindness, walk humbly before your God.”

Guys in here – Ryan, Magnetic and hundreds more – put on a show.  They “philosophize” about the big complex questions of existence; they memorize prayers and verses; they recite rules and principles of conduct, and they miss the simple message Steve Jobs addressed:  they forget to live like Christ. 

And as I thought about that I realized prison isn’t so different from the real world.  If only we were more compassionate, more forgiving, more merciful.

The other week I received a letter from a man I’d never met.  He’d heard of my situation from a mutual friend and wrote a letter which contained among other things, an interview with the former Catholic Bishop of Richmond, a tireless advocate for prison reform.  It was a warm letter and touched me deeply.  This man and his wife did not know me, yet they wrote to bolster my spirits.  Perhaps Steve Jobs was a little too quick to miss the efforts of some to live a little more like God intended.