Dateline March 30, 2012
A SATIRE
Of course the parole commission ruled against me. Let me tell you how it really was — a panel of three gray foxes, two females and a male — looking down their long noses at me, the fluffy white rabbit, sitting before them, guarded by two coyote clerks. An aged Rottweiler sitting beside me rifles through his documents spread out on the table — my defender and attorney, W. J. — battered and scarred from many battles, but still possessing his sharp teeth and sinewy muscles, the only force keeping me from being eaten alive by these predators.
In the row behind W.J., the Rottweiler, sits another fluffy white bunny, a female, Lizzie, my mate. With curled lip, she directs a low hiss of contempt at the three foxes staring at me. She has been here before and holds no false hope of witnessing any display of justice.
A scholarly brown female owl, the court reporter, sets up her equipment to one side, her feathers poised to document every word.
In struts two angry wolves, one a limping old lobo with a mangy pelt, wicked eyes tearing and sagging from too much drink and late night moon howling, but still threatening and in the position of pack leader, followed close behind by his former mate, a younger, snarling female, with bleached blonde fur, fangs glinting in the conference room lights. Her bushy ears twitch this way and that as she glares at the hostile crowd of bunnies, hens, an occasional rooster, sheep and goats, and a few tasty squirrels, all here to ask for mercy for their loved ones caught in the tiny cages out back.
The two wolves throw down their bulging briefcases on the opposition table, low grumbling growls burbling from their throats at W.J., whose hackles immediately raise in response. The Rottweiler bares his teeth at the wolves, snarling and growling at the two shocked predators, then bounds across the room after them, barking ferociously.
The wolves, Markie and Pammy, scramble around the table, freaked out at this old guard dog’s sudden attack, surprised by the daring and aggression of the only Alpha male in the room. W.J. dashes past Pammy, ignoring her, zeroing in on Markie cowering behind her. With one powerful move, W.J. knocks the old wolf on his backside and grips his exposed throat with fangs that mean business. Markie whimpers and pees on himself, cringing in submission. Two coyotes rush to the wolf’s aid, but W.J.’s growls warn them off.
The gray fox in charge bangs her gavel, calling for order. W.J. releases the mangy throat, barks several times for good measure, and whirls around, facing toward his chair and me, his client, who is putting up a good front while actually trembling beneath my fur.
The audience cheers. Rabbits and bunnies whistle, hens cackle, roosters crow, sheep and goats bleat, while several squirrels chee-chee-chee.
“Order!” shouts the gray fox, banging her gavel.
The Rottweiler stops at the wolves’ table, sniffs, cocks hios leg and pees on the table support, marking it as his territory. The female wolf, Pammy, in heat, emboldened and aroused by the war dog’s dominance display, patters after him, long snout extended forward, and sniffs his butt. W.J. turns on her, growls, snaps, and she retreats with tail between her legs, properly chastened.
W.J. begins with a spirited presentation that outlines all that I have accomplished in prison, and rebuts the wolves’ previous allegations that I am a threat to them, outlining my peaceful, nonviolent nature, as a follower of personages such as Gandhi, Mother Teresa, Martin Luther King, and Bill Cosby. Mild applause and a few cheers erupt spontaneously from the audience. W.J. bows, then takes his seat beside me.
The grizzled old male wolf opens his briefcase and digs in it. Several Milk Bones fall onto the floor, but are quickly snapped up by Pammy and the two coyotes. He retrieves a pint bottle that is half-filled with brown liquid, takes a long swallow, and sighs, smiling.
“Cough syrup,” he says with a straight face, putting the bottle back into the briefcase. The crowd boos and hisses. Markie growls at them, pink tongue licking his yellowed, broken fangs at the sight of a particularly delectable lamb, which squeezes closer to her mother. He turns back to the three-fox panel, clears his throat, and points his paw at me. My eyes widen in alarm. I am ready to race out of there, into the crowd. W.J. pats my shoulder, comforting me.
“Mister and Missus commissioners, look at that rabbit,” Markie snarls. “Don’t be fooled by his calm demeanor.”
Calm demeanor? I am scared to death!
“Look at those long ears, those buck teeth, those sharp little claws on his feet. He is a dangerous beast!”
Boos and hisses buzz from the crowd. The old wolf snaps his jaws at them, fangs menacing. Everyone draws back in fear.
“That rabbit threatened me! If you dare let him go free, he will track me down and kill me, and I have proof.”
More boos and hisses come from the crowd. Markie bends down and drags out a previously unnoticed box from beneath the table. He unlatches the lid, reaches in, and pulls out a huge snake, a python, beady yellow eyes leering, black tongue flicking in and out from the slit of a mouth. The python uncoils onto the table, spreads its length over the files and papers, and raises its head two feet into the air. The crowd gasps in shock and fear. Several squirrels scramble for the exit and are gone. The snake hisses, menacing the entire room. The female wolf yelps, leaping backward several feet before regaining control. Markie sniffs the vile reptile, then begins.
“This is my witness, Greg the Snake. He may look mean, but that’s because of the deprived life he’s lived. He’s really a sweetheart, a pussycat. He will do anything I say, won’t you, Greg?”
The python attempts a smile, failing miserably. His snaky eyes zero in on a brown rabbit in the first row. He licks the air with his tongue. The brown rabbit bolts from the room. The crowd boos.
Markie continues. “Two years ago, my witness, Greg the snake, shared a cage with that — that — monster, that white bunny rabbit.”
He points at me. I cringe.
“Do not be fooled by his cute little fur coat or those big eyes, that twitching pink nose, or the cottontail, ladies and gentleman. Beneath that meek exterior lurks a vicious killer, a ruthless murderer.”
Pammy nods at the gray fox with the gavel. She returns the nod, some silent communication agreed upon.
“Why the entire time poor little Greg here was in that cage with that — that — assassin — he feared for his life.” The wolf’s eyes dart around the room, judging the effect, then looks quickly toward the ceiling, perhaps anticipating lightning striking him dead. Nothing happens, so he continues. “That monster, Charlie Cottontail — don’t be fooled by him. He is a master manipulator. Thirty-two years ago, when I was a young wolf prosecutor in Tampa, after several fine, upstanding citizens and I sent his rabbit ass to prison for life, he sent me a Christmas card threatening my life. It said, ‘Merry Christmas from Raiford, wish you were here.’
“Why, I was so frightened by that insidious rabbit’s threats that I began drinking myself senseless every night. Ask Pammy here. She was just a baby cub at the time, but she will verify everything I say. It was the first and only Christmas card I ever got, and it had to come from that diabolical rabbit, Charlie Cottontail.”
Markie looks at Pammy. She nods affirmatively. Of course it must be true. They are both elected political wolves. They would never lie or even consider stretching the truth for their ambitions.
Markie picks up where he left off. “I had to seek psychiatric help, ladies and gentleman. Can you imagine how I felt? My first Christmas card! In my wolfpack we didn’t know about Christmas or Santa Claus, or any of that Jesus legend stuff. I never got anything but a bone to chew on when I was small.”
Markie whimpers. The three gray foxes dab their eyes with hankies. Pammy peeks around the audience to gauge the reaction. The audience is rolling its collective eyes. A poodle sticks its paw in its mouth in a gagging gesture. The snake rolls belly up in surrender.
“I couldn’t sleep, I was so worried,” he says. “I couldn’t eat, not even a juicy lamb.” The crowd cringes . A red hen cackles. The foxes and coyotes nod their heads in commiseration. Pammy licks her rear end.
All my fur fell out! I got the mange — can you imagine? Me! The mange! I came down with worms! The vet tried everything. I paced my lair, night after night, sick with fear, worried that — that — that — monster was coming after me. I could hear his little bunny feet hippity hopping outside my door.” He pauses for a deep breath.
“It broke up my marriage. I couldn’t perform in the bedroom, if you know what I mean, and she left me for a Great Dane!” Markie glances at W.J., the Rottweiler, whose tongue lolls as he pants and smiles at Markie’s phony revelations.
“I quit the state attorney’s office and became a mafia lawyer. I got off drug dealers, prostitutes, child molesters, rapists, even serial killers. I chased ambulances! I admit it. I picked up stray, mangy mongrels and spent the nights with them, I so feared being alone. I even flirted with suicide, ladies and gentleman. I would get drunk, then run out into traffic on Interstate 4, risking death. I almost became roadkill, all because of that nasty rabbit!”
Foaming at the mouth, eyes blazing, Markie points his paw at me. The three gray foxes are glaring at me, as are all the predators in the room. I’m a goner. I’m even considering I should stand up and shout, “KILL ME!” but I can’t think of any reason I should die for Markie’s sins. Two sheep and a goat slink out the back door. The crowd is noticeably smaller. My friend, Dennis, a friendly St. Bernard, has been snapping photos, documenting the event. As he takes a nice shot of Pammy sniffing herself while Markie foams at the mouth, the head gray fox orders him to cease photography. Two coyote clerks hurry over to confiscate Dennis’ camera. He growls, baring his teeth. They stop in their tracks. He starts to go after them, but my priest, Father Robert, a graying English Mastiff, restrains him. Reluctantly, Dennis lets the coyotes live.
“It took me years of therapy to get back to my career of putting dangerous creatures like that white rabbit over there on Death Row, where they belong, Markie says. He takes a breath. Pammy nuzzles his neck in encouragement. He licks her in return.
“Ladies and gentleman, I am scared to death of Charlie Cottontail.”
A loud clatter interrupts Markie’s indictment. The court reporter falls out of her chair, knocking over her steno machine, shocked by the incredulity of what she is hearing. Embarrassed, she straightens the machine and resumes typing the testimony. She looks upward at the ceiling, perhaps worried that the roof will cave in. It holds.
“Greg, the snake, will swear to you that when he was in the cage with that mad rabbit there, that he swore he was going to get me when he got out. He wants to set up sniper’s nests in trees in my neighborhood and shoot me,” Markie says. “I know you’re thinking that rabbits can’t climb trees, but this is no ordinary rabbit. This is a cagey creature so deadly that he scares wolves, ladies and gentleman. That rabbit, Charlie Cottontail, scared this big snake almost to death!”
The diminished crowd hisses and boos Markie’s tall tale. The weasely wolf takes another swig of his “cough syrup,” coughs a few times, composes himself and continues.
“Now, that old — that old — mutt — over there —”
W.J.’s hackles stand straight up on his neck and back. He growls and begins to move toward Markie and Pammy. Markie backs up, tail between his legs, front paws held out in supplication. W.J. returns to his table. The audience cheers.
“As — as I was saying,” Markie says. “My esteemed colleague, W.J., will tell you that my pet snake here has a bad record, he’s a career criminal, a liar, a cheat, a professional snitch for hire, a fraud, and he’s just trying to get released from prison for his own crimes, that he’s a lowlife piece of crap, and you can’t believe a word he says.” Markie takes a breath. The snake hangs its head in shame. Markie lovingly rubs its neck with his furry paw. “That is all true. It is in the record. I cannot deny it, but I tell you today that the snake you see here before you is a changed snake. I trust him, and you should trust him.”
The snake lowers its head to the table, uncoils, and lies still. The crowd boos. The python raises its head toward the audience, its yellow eyes flashing hatred. Its tongue flicks out, but Markie motions for him to remain calm.
“The experience of being caged with that psychopathic rabbit over there, hearing the vile atrocities he has planned for poor little Pammy and me — ladies and gentleman — it changed his life!”
Hoots, whistles, cackles, and boos fill the room in derision. The wolves and snake are pummeled with acorns, tomatoes, and radishes raining down on them from the audience. A duck flies around the room and splats a stinking mess on Markie’s head. The gray fox bangs her gavel for order. Pammy cleans Markie’s fur with a hanky. He reaches into the box, retrieves a piece of white cloth, and attaches it to the snake’s neck.
“I present to you today, Reverend Greg the Snake.”
The snake rises up from the table, a white clerical collar fastened around his neck. The crowd collectively gasps at the blasphemy.
“I assure you that Reverend Greg would put his hand on a stack of Bibles — if he had a hand, and if we had a stack of Bibles.” He looks around the room. “I don’t believe there are any Bibles in this room, or in this building, for that matter,” Markie says. “But don’t take just Reverend Greg’s word for it. Take mine! You can believe me. I would never tell a lie. I am an elected politician…”
You know what happened. The three gray foxes weighed all the damning evidence against me, ignored everything said on my behalf, made a fair decision that I was a risk, that the wolves and the snake were honest, decent citizens, and that the audience was fair game. Fortunately the visitors and loved ones got off the premises before the wolves, foxes, coyotes and snake could make a meal of any of them.
As for me, W.J., my defender, the tough Rottweiler, ably held them off until I was safely back in my cage, where I remain, until next time.
And that’s how they conduct beastly parole hearings in Florida.
THE END
Sunday, April 22, 2012
Tuesday, April 17, 2012
SOMETHING INTERESTING HAPPENED IN PRISON...
Dateline April 1, 2012
ON THE WAY OUT OF THE VISITING PARK TODAY…
In spite of what could be looked at as a demoralizing experience, being snatched up and shipped to a prison further from home, farther west than I ever was before, for a clearly punitive reason (that‘s how power-mad Tampa oligarchs smite those they can’t kill — use their abusive authority to break them — NOTE TO MARK: IT DOESN’T WORK), there are some interesting moments that cause me to stop and think.
One of those moments occurred today, at an obscure Florida prison nearerr to New Orleans than to Tampa or Jacksonville, where I’ve resided since March 28th, in limbo, waiting for another shipment to a secret location closer to New Orleans than to Tallahassee, even.
My dearest friend, Libby, made the pilgrimage from Jacksonville to share Palm Sunday and lift my spirits, offering me much needed moral support. At 8:00 AM (Central Time Zone) the dorm officer released me, and I headed upfront to the visiting area.
After walking the barren grounds of Wakulla Annex the past sixteen months, the soothing landscaped beds of bright petunias blooming between cycads pleasantly surprised me. Maybe this place wasn’t as bad as others had claimed. We had a nice visit, and it seemed like only minutes had passed, rather than six hours, before it was time to say goodbye. That is always the hardest part.
When it was my turn to go through the humiliating exit procedures of taking off one’s clothes, exposing one’s most private parts to a critical stranger, “squatting and coughing,” I entered the shakedown room. A tall, unusually older but fit prison officer with a combed-back shock of thick white hair addressed me. “Pardon me, but you don’t look like someone who should be in prison.”
Actually, I hear that a lot. Sometimes I will respond flippantly and say, “I wish you’d been on my jury,” or “I wish you’d tell the judge.” See “How Should I look?” that appears somewhere in cyberspace.
But this remark didn’t call for a flippant response. The man, a complete stranger who’d never laid eyes on me before today, made an observation that deserved an honest answer.
I wondered what he saw in me that informed his gut instincts that I was somehow different from the teeming masses of fellow prisoners who swarm in blueclad hordes to the chowhall three times a day. One of my prison survival strategies gleaned from years of watching nature shows on PBS has been to become like the zebra or wildebeest on the Serenghetti Plain, blend in with the herd, stay in the middle, don’t lag behind in the periphery and get picked off by the lions, keep my head down, let them choose someone else to be an example. To some extent that works, except during those times like today, when I must stand naked and alone.
When I’m in that crowd, packed into a cramped vestibule with dozens of prisoners jammed together like Tokyo commuters waiting to be released to join seemingly endless queue outside, rain or shine, I notice those around me just as I feel their eyes on me, wondering.
This is the bottom of the barrel. It doesn’t get any lower than this. I am surrounded by sad men with roughly-shaved heads, the homeless, the unemployable, the alcoholics, the drug-addicted, the illiterate, the lost, the pitiful men you recoiled from when they panhandled in parking lots with crud-encrusted outstretched palms. They are in here with me now, not much different than when they were out there except for the “three hots and a cot,” regular meals and a clean place to sleep, fairly free of the temptations of cigarettes, booze and addictive substances, unless you count the psychotropic drugs they zone out on.
And they look bad! I could write a book, The Prison of Scruffy Men, and describe the dull, vacant stares, the damaged, misshapen skulls, the scarred, lop-sided visages healed wrong, or not at all, the shuffling, limping walks of odd-lengthed legs, the thirty-year olds who look like badly-weathered seventy-year olds on meth, and worse.
These men are not the unfortunate foreclosed and laid off bankrupts fruitlessly sending out resumes to Monstar.com that you see on the nightly news, adding to the unemployment figures, debating whether to vote for Romney, Santorum or Obama, wondering who will lower the price of gasoline. These men have never imagined scaling such heights.
They could tell you the best dumpsters to find a discarded burger behind a McDonalds or Wendy’s in Orlando or Miami, or the safest abandoned buildings where a man can sleep on a piece of cardboard with a lesser chance of being beaten up by violent teenage gangs out for Saturday night sport, but the lives that average citizens live are as alien to them as life on the International Space Station.
Just the fact that a well-dressed, smiling lady drove across the state to see me for a few hours speaks volumes to the guards, setting me apart from the vast majority of prisoners who have burned their bridges, who have no family or friends who would bother to visit them even if they weren’t stranded in some distant Florida gulag. The officer asking the question of why I am in prison based it somewhat on his observation of us both, how we carried ourselves, so the question covered Libby, too. She didn’t look like someone who should be visiting someone in prison, either.
I admit it. I am different. I don’t want to be the same as everyone else, despite my camouflage techniques in the crowd. Notwithstanding 34 years’ imprisonment this week (Happy Anniversary to me), I am in this world, but not of this world. I have fought not to become one of the institutionalized lost boys I’ve documented so long, and I pray I never will be. It was a confirmation of my efforts that this prison officer saw something in me that he didn’t see in the others parading past him all day, and wondered why.
I gave him the abbreviated two-minute explanation. Few people want to hear long, sad stories, except in movie theaters.
“You’re right,” I said. “And I thank you for saying that, sir. I got some powerful, corrupt people mad at me a long time ago, and wound up getting life in prison for a murder that two other men committed.”
“You got in with a bad crowd.”
“Yes, sir, I did.”
“You lie down with dogs…”
“You’re right,” I said. “One of the men had a wealthy father who paid off some people, and over three years after the crime was committed in 1975, they were given immunity from prosecution for murder in exchange for their false testimony that I told them I did it. You should know that only the guilty are given immunity. The innocent don’t need it.”
I continued. “The only eyewitness testified that it wasn’t me, that the shooter was much shorter and smaller than I was, and I demanded a jury trial. I refused the prosecutor’s increasingly lenient plea bargains for a reduced sentence that would have freed me thirty years ago. I insulted him, which made him my lifelong enemy. Without his objections to my parole, I would have been free nine years ago.”
“I’m real sorry to hear that,” the man said. “As soon as I heard you speak, I could tell that you are an educated person from a good family. That’s a real shame.”
“I appreciate that.”
“You take care of yourself,” he said.
I went out the exit door and onto the prison yard.
The conversation lasted only a few minutes, but it kept me thinking for hours. Later that night, after Libby had finally made it home, I telephoned her about the unusual conversation. She was equally amazed at the man’s astute observations.
Many encounters with prison guards are in a negative context, so this one stood out for its uniqueness. I decided to sit down right then and write this account while it was still fresh in my mind.
So here I am. It is late, we are locked in our cells, the lights are off, and I am writing by the yard lights that glare into the tiny window onto my bunk.
There is much more to my prison survival that I’ve been documenting for years, and will continue to do, but that brief interlude with the officer encouraged me, believing that, in the midst of all the evil, hatred and negativity that surrounds me, I am doing something right, and someone noticed.
Charlie
ON THE WAY OUT OF THE VISITING PARK TODAY…
In spite of what could be looked at as a demoralizing experience, being snatched up and shipped to a prison further from home, farther west than I ever was before, for a clearly punitive reason (that‘s how power-mad Tampa oligarchs smite those they can’t kill — use their abusive authority to break them — NOTE TO MARK: IT DOESN’T WORK), there are some interesting moments that cause me to stop and think.
One of those moments occurred today, at an obscure Florida prison nearerr to New Orleans than to Tampa or Jacksonville, where I’ve resided since March 28th, in limbo, waiting for another shipment to a secret location closer to New Orleans than to Tallahassee, even.
My dearest friend, Libby, made the pilgrimage from Jacksonville to share Palm Sunday and lift my spirits, offering me much needed moral support. At 8:00 AM (Central Time Zone) the dorm officer released me, and I headed upfront to the visiting area.
After walking the barren grounds of Wakulla Annex the past sixteen months, the soothing landscaped beds of bright petunias blooming between cycads pleasantly surprised me. Maybe this place wasn’t as bad as others had claimed. We had a nice visit, and it seemed like only minutes had passed, rather than six hours, before it was time to say goodbye. That is always the hardest part.
When it was my turn to go through the humiliating exit procedures of taking off one’s clothes, exposing one’s most private parts to a critical stranger, “squatting and coughing,” I entered the shakedown room. A tall, unusually older but fit prison officer with a combed-back shock of thick white hair addressed me. “Pardon me, but you don’t look like someone who should be in prison.”
Actually, I hear that a lot. Sometimes I will respond flippantly and say, “I wish you’d been on my jury,” or “I wish you’d tell the judge.” See “How Should I look?” that appears somewhere in cyberspace.
But this remark didn’t call for a flippant response. The man, a complete stranger who’d never laid eyes on me before today, made an observation that deserved an honest answer.
I wondered what he saw in me that informed his gut instincts that I was somehow different from the teeming masses of fellow prisoners who swarm in blueclad hordes to the chowhall three times a day. One of my prison survival strategies gleaned from years of watching nature shows on PBS has been to become like the zebra or wildebeest on the Serenghetti Plain, blend in with the herd, stay in the middle, don’t lag behind in the periphery and get picked off by the lions, keep my head down, let them choose someone else to be an example. To some extent that works, except during those times like today, when I must stand naked and alone.
When I’m in that crowd, packed into a cramped vestibule with dozens of prisoners jammed together like Tokyo commuters waiting to be released to join seemingly endless queue outside, rain or shine, I notice those around me just as I feel their eyes on me, wondering.
This is the bottom of the barrel. It doesn’t get any lower than this. I am surrounded by sad men with roughly-shaved heads, the homeless, the unemployable, the alcoholics, the drug-addicted, the illiterate, the lost, the pitiful men you recoiled from when they panhandled in parking lots with crud-encrusted outstretched palms. They are in here with me now, not much different than when they were out there except for the “three hots and a cot,” regular meals and a clean place to sleep, fairly free of the temptations of cigarettes, booze and addictive substances, unless you count the psychotropic drugs they zone out on.
And they look bad! I could write a book, The Prison of Scruffy Men, and describe the dull, vacant stares, the damaged, misshapen skulls, the scarred, lop-sided visages healed wrong, or not at all, the shuffling, limping walks of odd-lengthed legs, the thirty-year olds who look like badly-weathered seventy-year olds on meth, and worse.
These men are not the unfortunate foreclosed and laid off bankrupts fruitlessly sending out resumes to Monstar.com that you see on the nightly news, adding to the unemployment figures, debating whether to vote for Romney, Santorum or Obama, wondering who will lower the price of gasoline. These men have never imagined scaling such heights.
They could tell you the best dumpsters to find a discarded burger behind a McDonalds or Wendy’s in Orlando or Miami, or the safest abandoned buildings where a man can sleep on a piece of cardboard with a lesser chance of being beaten up by violent teenage gangs out for Saturday night sport, but the lives that average citizens live are as alien to them as life on the International Space Station.
Just the fact that a well-dressed, smiling lady drove across the state to see me for a few hours speaks volumes to the guards, setting me apart from the vast majority of prisoners who have burned their bridges, who have no family or friends who would bother to visit them even if they weren’t stranded in some distant Florida gulag. The officer asking the question of why I am in prison based it somewhat on his observation of us both, how we carried ourselves, so the question covered Libby, too. She didn’t look like someone who should be visiting someone in prison, either.
I admit it. I am different. I don’t want to be the same as everyone else, despite my camouflage techniques in the crowd. Notwithstanding 34 years’ imprisonment this week (Happy Anniversary to me), I am in this world, but not of this world. I have fought not to become one of the institutionalized lost boys I’ve documented so long, and I pray I never will be. It was a confirmation of my efforts that this prison officer saw something in me that he didn’t see in the others parading past him all day, and wondered why.
I gave him the abbreviated two-minute explanation. Few people want to hear long, sad stories, except in movie theaters.
“You’re right,” I said. “And I thank you for saying that, sir. I got some powerful, corrupt people mad at me a long time ago, and wound up getting life in prison for a murder that two other men committed.”
“You got in with a bad crowd.”
“Yes, sir, I did.”
“You lie down with dogs…”
“You’re right,” I said. “One of the men had a wealthy father who paid off some people, and over three years after the crime was committed in 1975, they were given immunity from prosecution for murder in exchange for their false testimony that I told them I did it. You should know that only the guilty are given immunity. The innocent don’t need it.”
I continued. “The only eyewitness testified that it wasn’t me, that the shooter was much shorter and smaller than I was, and I demanded a jury trial. I refused the prosecutor’s increasingly lenient plea bargains for a reduced sentence that would have freed me thirty years ago. I insulted him, which made him my lifelong enemy. Without his objections to my parole, I would have been free nine years ago.”
“I’m real sorry to hear that,” the man said. “As soon as I heard you speak, I could tell that you are an educated person from a good family. That’s a real shame.”
“I appreciate that.”
“You take care of yourself,” he said.
I went out the exit door and onto the prison yard.
The conversation lasted only a few minutes, but it kept me thinking for hours. Later that night, after Libby had finally made it home, I telephoned her about the unusual conversation. She was equally amazed at the man’s astute observations.
Many encounters with prison guards are in a negative context, so this one stood out for its uniqueness. I decided to sit down right then and write this account while it was still fresh in my mind.
So here I am. It is late, we are locked in our cells, the lights are off, and I am writing by the yard lights that glare into the tiny window onto my bunk.
There is much more to my prison survival that I’ve been documenting for years, and will continue to do, but that brief interlude with the officer encouraged me, believing that, in the midst of all the evil, hatred and negativity that surrounds me, I am doing something right, and someone noticed.
Charlie
Monday, April 2, 2012
PAROLE HEARING UPDATE
dateline: March 24, 2012
On Wednesday, March 21, 2012, my third parole hearing was held. Bottom line — no breaks — they put me off three more years — until 2017, because of the objection of the corrupt Hillsborough prosecutor, who it appears now was the instigator of the false 2010 disciplinary report by the DOC, the KKK prison guard article.
A number of people contributed to a valiant release effort. Jack Murphy, who spoke powerfully at the October 26, 2011, hearing, had a speaking engagement in Indiana and could not attend, but the previous week, he came to Tallahassee and did some high-powered consulting with Louie B. Wainwright, retired Secretary of the Florida DOC and one of the most influential people in Tallahassee. Louie called Bernard Cohen, the new parole commissioner, whom he has known for decades, and he and Murf went to Cohen’s office to bring him up to speed.
The decision was predetermined before my people walked into the hearing room, it appeared, but at least Mr. Cohen knows our side of the story if we have a re-hearing.
Attorney Bill Sheppard again appeared on my behalf, and I couldn’t ask for a finer advocate even if Perry Mason was still alive. He’d previously sent the commission a 35-page presentation that covered all the flaws and points in dispute from the October hearing, which set the legal bar high, challenging their inaction and demanding that the commissioners comply with the requirements of due process. I have read many hundreds of parole appeals in the law books, and it is shameful how the rules and laws are ignored and circumvented. Bottom line there — I knew from the beginning that we wouldn’t get justice, no matter how deserving of release I am. We have been preparing to take the matter to court all along so that a judge can overrule their improper decision. It is a long, difficult and expensive undertaking.
Libby made the three-hour drive to Tallahassee, and she was joined at the hearing by Father Bob Anderson, retired, and old friend, Rev. Dennis St. Lawrence, who took photos of the hearing participants until Chairman Tena Pate told him to stop. That ticked off Dennis, who showed a valid “Press” card, and he is considering a complaint against Pate for violating the laws on public hearings.
Bobby Greenwood spoke in Murf’s absence, supported by his wife, Bunny. Hugh MacMillan and Ken Cooper provided moral support, attending the hearing to speak on behalf of another man seeking release.
On the opposing side, state attorney Mark Ober was joined by his former protégé and now Florida’s Attorney General, Pam Bondi, who was taking some time off from raiding pill mills, supporting Mitt Romney, and running for governor. Little-known fact: when I was a high school student at King High in Tampa, I worked as a bagboy at the Winn Dixie/Kwik Chek supermarket in Temple Terrace. I knew well Pam’s parents, Dr. John Bondi, who was an English professor at U.S.F., and his wife. I don’t remember their children, who would have been babies or toddlers during those years.
Prof. Bondi was always very encouraging to me, urging me to major ion English. I was a top student, got an academic scholarship to USF, and tried to enroll in Prof. Bondi’s English class, but it was filled early, so I took Dr. John Parker’s class by default. He was the father of a fellow student, and I also knew him. He had the reputation of bring the toughest professor in the English Department, but I made all “A’s” in every class of his that I took, effectively launching my early writing career.
I bagged a lot of Bondi groceries between 1967 and 1970, when I left the grocery business. Dr. and Mrs. Bondi gave me many a quarter for my labors and were always very cordial to me and supportive of my efforts. I was sad to learn of Prof. Bondi’s passing a few years ago.
Ober has such a grudge and personal vendetta against me that it has blinded him to how his frantic, extreme behavior appears to the public. He claims to be in fear of me — he told this to a reporter! — and fears I’ll set up a sniper nest near his house if I get out. Come on, Mark! You need to know that you are only the center of the universe in your own universe, certainly not in mine — I have plenty of better interests.
There is written proof that I forgave him all his transgressions against me decades ago. I am a committed Christian, strong in my faith, and I fully embraced the principle that you must bless and pray for those who persecute you, which I have done for many years. Only a person who is spiritually bankrupt and morally poisoned cannot conceive of such a thing. It’s a shame, really, but I know that the Lord protects me. That doesn’t mean I can’t be a witness and document his actions as he deteriorates.
Many, many positive factors in my favor were ignored by the parole commission. This oversight and other lapses will be addressed in court. The commission is intimidated by Ober, which is a shame. Let us pray that justice will prevail in time.
As for myself, coincidentally, on the Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday — the 19th – 21st — before and during the parole hearing, I attended an “Anger Resolution Seminar” in the chapel, sponsored by the Institute in Basic Life Principles. It proved to be a very powerful course. A seminary student from Texas provided at least 12 hours of DVD lectures by Rev. William Gotthard, and I learned a lot about Biblical principles used to resolve anger. A couple of guys said it was convenient that I took the class when I did, but I already had a good grip on my emotions. The course helped to put many things in perspective.
I want to thank all the good people who have worked and prayed on my behalf, and I want you to know your efforts weren’t wasted. We are getting closer, and I am spiritually and mentally strong. I’m especially grateful to my long-time friend, Gary Smigiel, who has watched my back for almost thirty years, whose efforts have kept us in the game.
There’s much more, and if you want to find out the rest, let me know. Meanwhile, I have some legal research to do. God bless you, and Happy Easter.
Charlie
On Wednesday, March 21, 2012, my third parole hearing was held. Bottom line — no breaks — they put me off three more years — until 2017, because of the objection of the corrupt Hillsborough prosecutor, who it appears now was the instigator of the false 2010 disciplinary report by the DOC, the KKK prison guard article.
A number of people contributed to a valiant release effort. Jack Murphy, who spoke powerfully at the October 26, 2011, hearing, had a speaking engagement in Indiana and could not attend, but the previous week, he came to Tallahassee and did some high-powered consulting with Louie B. Wainwright, retired Secretary of the Florida DOC and one of the most influential people in Tallahassee. Louie called Bernard Cohen, the new parole commissioner, whom he has known for decades, and he and Murf went to Cohen’s office to bring him up to speed.
The decision was predetermined before my people walked into the hearing room, it appeared, but at least Mr. Cohen knows our side of the story if we have a re-hearing.
Attorney Bill Sheppard again appeared on my behalf, and I couldn’t ask for a finer advocate even if Perry Mason was still alive. He’d previously sent the commission a 35-page presentation that covered all the flaws and points in dispute from the October hearing, which set the legal bar high, challenging their inaction and demanding that the commissioners comply with the requirements of due process. I have read many hundreds of parole appeals in the law books, and it is shameful how the rules and laws are ignored and circumvented. Bottom line there — I knew from the beginning that we wouldn’t get justice, no matter how deserving of release I am. We have been preparing to take the matter to court all along so that a judge can overrule their improper decision. It is a long, difficult and expensive undertaking.
Libby made the three-hour drive to Tallahassee, and she was joined at the hearing by Father Bob Anderson, retired, and old friend, Rev. Dennis St. Lawrence, who took photos of the hearing participants until Chairman Tena Pate told him to stop. That ticked off Dennis, who showed a valid “Press” card, and he is considering a complaint against Pate for violating the laws on public hearings.
Bobby Greenwood spoke in Murf’s absence, supported by his wife, Bunny. Hugh MacMillan and Ken Cooper provided moral support, attending the hearing to speak on behalf of another man seeking release.
On the opposing side, state attorney Mark Ober was joined by his former protégé and now Florida’s Attorney General, Pam Bondi, who was taking some time off from raiding pill mills, supporting Mitt Romney, and running for governor. Little-known fact: when I was a high school student at King High in Tampa, I worked as a bagboy at the Winn Dixie/Kwik Chek supermarket in Temple Terrace. I knew well Pam’s parents, Dr. John Bondi, who was an English professor at U.S.F., and his wife. I don’t remember their children, who would have been babies or toddlers during those years.
Prof. Bondi was always very encouraging to me, urging me to major ion English. I was a top student, got an academic scholarship to USF, and tried to enroll in Prof. Bondi’s English class, but it was filled early, so I took Dr. John Parker’s class by default. He was the father of a fellow student, and I also knew him. He had the reputation of bring the toughest professor in the English Department, but I made all “A’s” in every class of his that I took, effectively launching my early writing career.
I bagged a lot of Bondi groceries between 1967 and 1970, when I left the grocery business. Dr. and Mrs. Bondi gave me many a quarter for my labors and were always very cordial to me and supportive of my efforts. I was sad to learn of Prof. Bondi’s passing a few years ago.
Ober has such a grudge and personal vendetta against me that it has blinded him to how his frantic, extreme behavior appears to the public. He claims to be in fear of me — he told this to a reporter! — and fears I’ll set up a sniper nest near his house if I get out. Come on, Mark! You need to know that you are only the center of the universe in your own universe, certainly not in mine — I have plenty of better interests.
There is written proof that I forgave him all his transgressions against me decades ago. I am a committed Christian, strong in my faith, and I fully embraced the principle that you must bless and pray for those who persecute you, which I have done for many years. Only a person who is spiritually bankrupt and morally poisoned cannot conceive of such a thing. It’s a shame, really, but I know that the Lord protects me. That doesn’t mean I can’t be a witness and document his actions as he deteriorates.
Many, many positive factors in my favor were ignored by the parole commission. This oversight and other lapses will be addressed in court. The commission is intimidated by Ober, which is a shame. Let us pray that justice will prevail in time.
As for myself, coincidentally, on the Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday — the 19th – 21st — before and during the parole hearing, I attended an “Anger Resolution Seminar” in the chapel, sponsored by the Institute in Basic Life Principles. It proved to be a very powerful course. A seminary student from Texas provided at least 12 hours of DVD lectures by Rev. William Gotthard, and I learned a lot about Biblical principles used to resolve anger. A couple of guys said it was convenient that I took the class when I did, but I already had a good grip on my emotions. The course helped to put many things in perspective.
I want to thank all the good people who have worked and prayed on my behalf, and I want you to know your efforts weren’t wasted. We are getting closer, and I am spiritually and mentally strong. I’m especially grateful to my long-time friend, Gary Smigiel, who has watched my back for almost thirty years, whose efforts have kept us in the game.
There’s much more, and if you want to find out the rest, let me know. Meanwhile, I have some legal research to do. God bless you, and Happy Easter.
Charlie
Sunday, February 26, 2012
A NEW POEM FOR THE COMING OF SPRING
02/09/12
SPRINGS ETERNAL
Whoever said ‘tis better to have loved and lost
than ne’er to have loved a’tall apparently
ne’er suffered the rapier thrust of betrayal
piercing through and through his heart, then felt
the withdrawal ripping, deflating, the soul exhaling
with a whisper…gone…gone…‘till
the next time, when new love
seals the tears with hope that,
this time, this time,
love will last
forever.
by Charles Patrick Norman
Sunday, February 5, 2012
DOING TIME: 25 Years of Prison Writing,” A review
Dateline: Jan. 26, 2012
Accolades are due Bell Chevigny’s opening of the prison literary vaults at PEN for the world to see in DOING TIME: 25 Years of Prison Writing. As one of the original prisoner contributors, with “Pearl Got Stabbed,” to the 1999 edition, I was anxious to see not only how well the writings held up against the passage of time, but also whether the works retained their relevance in the “modern” world of corrections. I needn’t have been concerned.
I’d scarcely returned with my copy of the new book to the rec yard, crowded with prisoners when an old convict spied the provocative cover art of a hand grasping steel bars, and asked, “What you got there? Can I see that?”
Several curious men crowded around to see. Prisoners are nosy. I explained where I got the book and read some passages out loud. They were captivated. Old timers nodded in recognition of the universality of prison experiences and young prisoners, “newcocks,” stood transfixed in thought. The reaction by the guards was even more revealing.
I asked an older, experienced correctional officer for his opinion, handing him the book. In between his duties, he seemed rapt in concentration, reading. Then a younger, more gung ho “hotshot” guard, one of those who come into prison needing to prove their toughness, joined the older man, who passed him the book. Two hours later I finally got my book back.
The younger man looked at me, shook his head, seemingly chastened, and said, “I had no idea.”
The older man said, “Wow!”
DOING TIME is a timeless work of prison literature that should be required reading for those involved in the world of corrections, from prisoners and guards, corrections officials, legislators who pass increasingly draconian laws, lawyers and judges, to the state governors who sign the death warrants and free those souls from Hell.
Ms. Chevigny’s insightful additions to the 2011 volume, her masterful introduction and commentaries, the significance of encouraging America’s prisoners to write, what their words say about our society, and what became of the fifty-one women and men chosen to represent the other 2.3 million people incarcerated in this country, provide a poignant counterpoint to the selections. We owe her a debt of gratitude.
I am honored to have been included in such rare company.
Charles P. Norman Wakulla C.I. Annex, Crawfordville, FL
ORDERING INFORMATION — DOING TIME: 25 Years of Prison Writing, A PEN American Center Prize Anthology, edited by Bell Gale Chevigny, Foreword by Sister Helen Prejean, Copyright 2011 by PEN American Center, Arcade Publishing, New York City, NY, ISBN: 978-1-61145-144-3 $17.95.
DOING TIME is available from the publisher at www.arcadepub.com, amd www.amazon.com ($12.21) or your local bookstore.
Charlie
Accolades are due Bell Chevigny’s opening of the prison literary vaults at PEN for the world to see in DOING TIME: 25 Years of Prison Writing. As one of the original prisoner contributors, with “Pearl Got Stabbed,” to the 1999 edition, I was anxious to see not only how well the writings held up against the passage of time, but also whether the works retained their relevance in the “modern” world of corrections. I needn’t have been concerned.
I’d scarcely returned with my copy of the new book to the rec yard, crowded with prisoners when an old convict spied the provocative cover art of a hand grasping steel bars, and asked, “What you got there? Can I see that?”
Several curious men crowded around to see. Prisoners are nosy. I explained where I got the book and read some passages out loud. They were captivated. Old timers nodded in recognition of the universality of prison experiences and young prisoners, “newcocks,” stood transfixed in thought. The reaction by the guards was even more revealing.
I asked an older, experienced correctional officer for his opinion, handing him the book. In between his duties, he seemed rapt in concentration, reading. Then a younger, more gung ho “hotshot” guard, one of those who come into prison needing to prove their toughness, joined the older man, who passed him the book. Two hours later I finally got my book back.
The younger man looked at me, shook his head, seemingly chastened, and said, “I had no idea.”
The older man said, “Wow!”
DOING TIME is a timeless work of prison literature that should be required reading for those involved in the world of corrections, from prisoners and guards, corrections officials, legislators who pass increasingly draconian laws, lawyers and judges, to the state governors who sign the death warrants and free those souls from Hell.
Ms. Chevigny’s insightful additions to the 2011 volume, her masterful introduction and commentaries, the significance of encouraging America’s prisoners to write, what their words say about our society, and what became of the fifty-one women and men chosen to represent the other 2.3 million people incarcerated in this country, provide a poignant counterpoint to the selections. We owe her a debt of gratitude.
I am honored to have been included in such rare company.
Charles P. Norman Wakulla C.I. Annex, Crawfordville, FL
ORDERING INFORMATION — DOING TIME: 25 Years of Prison Writing, A PEN American Center Prize Anthology, edited by Bell Gale Chevigny, Foreword by Sister Helen Prejean, Copyright 2011 by PEN American Center, Arcade Publishing, New York City, NY, ISBN: 978-1-61145-144-3 $17.95.
DOING TIME is available from the publisher at www.arcadepub.com, amd www.amazon.com ($12.21) or your local bookstore.
Charlie
Saturday, January 21, 2012
Who Am I? Who Are You? What’s On Your iPod?
Trying To Keep Pace With The Modern World From Prison
Dateline: January 22, 2012
A fellow prisoner’s mother sent him the current best-selling biography, Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson (Simon and Shuster, 627 pages, $35.00), and he let me read it. Mired deep in prison, isolated from the fast-spinning technoworld “outside,’ the exhaustive story of the Apple Computer co-founder and inventor of the Mac, the iPod, iPhone, and iPad, brought me almost up to date on what I’d missed over the past thirty-four years. No matter how hard I’ve tried: reading newspapers, magazines and books, educating myself, taking every class and program available, it has been next to impossible to keep up with the marvels of the modern age from “inside.”
I’ve never listened to Bob Dylan on an iPod, never held one in my hand, never downloaded music from the iTunes Store, never “swiped” a multi-touch screen of an iPad, never used an app on an iPhone, but after reading the fascinating story of Steve Jobs, a brilliant genius and world-class a__hole, who lost his battle with cancer in 2011, whose drive to change the world was partly fueled by his birth mother’s abandonment and his subsequent adoption, I realize why so many people need them. Steve Jobs’ inventions indeed changed the world.
My own computer experience began as a freshman at the University of South Florida in 1968. the first class I enrolled in was “Fortran Programming” for the IBM 360, a behemoth computer that took up an entire floor of the College of Engineering. The concept, “user friendly,” had not been invented yet, and everything about Fortran Programming was a trial. Each student had to buy a box of blank IBM punch cards in the bookstore, find the key punch machines on a different floor, and figure out how to turn on the machine, how to load the cards, and then to punch the little holes in them. This was before we could even think of writing a program, which usually came back with “Error, Error, Error” printed across the wide sheets of white and green computer paper.
My first encounter with an Apple computer began in 1980, in prison at Union C.I., Raiford, when I became the clerk of the Golab, the groundbreaking prisoner self-improvement program in the Southwest Unit. The only computers in prison then were a few in the classification office, connected directly to the DOC mainframe in Tallahassee. No prisoner had access to a computer.
A newly-arrived prisoner who’d been a radio Shack manager, told me he had a brand new Apple II computer and a couple hundred floppy disks at home, and if I could figure out the paperwork and get the approvals, he would donate the equipment to the Golab. He would teach me how to use the new computer if he could have access to it. Deal. Only months before, I’d convinced the Golab president, Martin J. “Lucky” Stack, to buy an RCA color camera, VCR, and color TV for the program, which we used for video feedback of mock job and parole interviews, making teaching/training tapes, and other innovative uses we made up as we went along. When “Lucky” Stack, a retired U. S. Navy captain and decorated war hero, saw how useful the video equipment was, he jumped on the tech train. He got the computer donation approved, saw the potential, and bought one for himself.
That was the first computer in the Florida prison system accessible to prisoners. Once we got it, nobody in the power structure paid any attention to it, and we worked with it unimpeded seven days a week, for years. In the following years, prison education programs obtained grants for computer instruction, and my early training with the Apple II positioned me to jump into these programs and teach various computer classes up to college level, including instructing prison administrators how to use their newfangled machines.
Over thirty years later, with the epidemic of sexual predators going to prison for kiddie porn and other computer-related crimes, a paranoid prison system has severely limited prisoner computer access. Convicted murderers are known as the most reliable, trusted workers, at the top of the prison social hierarchy, with sex offenders at the bottom of the barrel, but so many of them have filled the prisons in recent years that sheer numbers of prisoners with sex charges have made them seemingly more accepted. But the prison authorities forbid sex offenders computer access, and rightly so.
Steve Jobs would have approved of that policy. Criticized by some for his refusal to permit any apps on the iPhone that allowed pornography, he defended his position by saying, “You might care more about porn when you have kids. It’s not about freedom, it’s about Apple trying to do the right thing for its users.”
The iPod story spawned a question that I’ve never been asked, but has been asked of most everyone with white earbuds: “What’s on your iPod?” When she asked President George W. Bush what was on his iPod in 2005, Elizabeth Burmiller reported in the New York Times that he had selections from traditional country music singers including Bush favorites by Van Morrison and John Fogerty. A Rolling Stone editor analyzed Bush’s selections and commented, “One thing that’s interesting is that the president likes artists who don’t like him.”
Someone said that simply handing over your iPod to another opens you up like a book, that your musical selections define not just what you like, but who you are. If that is true, I am Steve Jobs. Or at least we have the same taste in music.
Steve Jobs’ iPod was heavy in Bob Dylan albums, his hero, and also the Bealtles. He had songs from seven Beatle albums, including A Hard Day’s Night, Abbey Road, Help!, Let It Be, Magical Mystery Tour, Meet The Beatles! and Sgt. Pepper’s Loney Hearts Club Band. The Rolling Stones were represented, as were many sixties artists such as Aretha, B.B. King, Buddy Holly, Buffalo Springfield, Don McLean, Donavan, The Doors, Janis Joplin, Jefferson Airplane, Jimi Hendrix, Johnny Cash, John Mellencamp, Simon and Garfunkel, and even The Monkees and Sam the Sham. Show your age — if you’re not at least fifty, you’ve probably never heard of some of those artists.
As he neared death, Steve Jobs thought more of getting older and his birth, as many people do. One of his favorite artists was Joni Mitchell, who put up her daughter for adoption and wrote the song, “Little Green,” about her little girl. He played Joni Mitchell’s greatest song, “Both Sides Now,” with its lyrics about being older and wiser: “I’ve looked at life from both sides now/From win and lose, and still somehow/ It’s life’s illusions I recall/ I really don’t know life at all.” She had recorded that song many years apart, first in 1969, and then ‘an excruciatingly haunting slow version” in 2000. Playing the latter version, Jobs noted, “It’s interesting how people age.”
I agree.
Perhaps when I am freed, I can ask Steve Jobs’ widow, Laurene Powell, to download a copy of his iPod playlist, since we thought so much alike.
By the way, what’s on your iPod?
Charlie
Dateline: January 22, 2012
A fellow prisoner’s mother sent him the current best-selling biography, Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson (Simon and Shuster, 627 pages, $35.00), and he let me read it. Mired deep in prison, isolated from the fast-spinning technoworld “outside,’ the exhaustive story of the Apple Computer co-founder and inventor of the Mac, the iPod, iPhone, and iPad, brought me almost up to date on what I’d missed over the past thirty-four years. No matter how hard I’ve tried: reading newspapers, magazines and books, educating myself, taking every class and program available, it has been next to impossible to keep up with the marvels of the modern age from “inside.”
I’ve never listened to Bob Dylan on an iPod, never held one in my hand, never downloaded music from the iTunes Store, never “swiped” a multi-touch screen of an iPad, never used an app on an iPhone, but after reading the fascinating story of Steve Jobs, a brilliant genius and world-class a__hole, who lost his battle with cancer in 2011, whose drive to change the world was partly fueled by his birth mother’s abandonment and his subsequent adoption, I realize why so many people need them. Steve Jobs’ inventions indeed changed the world.
My own computer experience began as a freshman at the University of South Florida in 1968. the first class I enrolled in was “Fortran Programming” for the IBM 360, a behemoth computer that took up an entire floor of the College of Engineering. The concept, “user friendly,” had not been invented yet, and everything about Fortran Programming was a trial. Each student had to buy a box of blank IBM punch cards in the bookstore, find the key punch machines on a different floor, and figure out how to turn on the machine, how to load the cards, and then to punch the little holes in them. This was before we could even think of writing a program, which usually came back with “Error, Error, Error” printed across the wide sheets of white and green computer paper.
My first encounter with an Apple computer began in 1980, in prison at Union C.I., Raiford, when I became the clerk of the Golab, the groundbreaking prisoner self-improvement program in the Southwest Unit. The only computers in prison then were a few in the classification office, connected directly to the DOC mainframe in Tallahassee. No prisoner had access to a computer.
A newly-arrived prisoner who’d been a radio Shack manager, told me he had a brand new Apple II computer and a couple hundred floppy disks at home, and if I could figure out the paperwork and get the approvals, he would donate the equipment to the Golab. He would teach me how to use the new computer if he could have access to it. Deal. Only months before, I’d convinced the Golab president, Martin J. “Lucky” Stack, to buy an RCA color camera, VCR, and color TV for the program, which we used for video feedback of mock job and parole interviews, making teaching/training tapes, and other innovative uses we made up as we went along. When “Lucky” Stack, a retired U. S. Navy captain and decorated war hero, saw how useful the video equipment was, he jumped on the tech train. He got the computer donation approved, saw the potential, and bought one for himself.
That was the first computer in the Florida prison system accessible to prisoners. Once we got it, nobody in the power structure paid any attention to it, and we worked with it unimpeded seven days a week, for years. In the following years, prison education programs obtained grants for computer instruction, and my early training with the Apple II positioned me to jump into these programs and teach various computer classes up to college level, including instructing prison administrators how to use their newfangled machines.
Over thirty years later, with the epidemic of sexual predators going to prison for kiddie porn and other computer-related crimes, a paranoid prison system has severely limited prisoner computer access. Convicted murderers are known as the most reliable, trusted workers, at the top of the prison social hierarchy, with sex offenders at the bottom of the barrel, but so many of them have filled the prisons in recent years that sheer numbers of prisoners with sex charges have made them seemingly more accepted. But the prison authorities forbid sex offenders computer access, and rightly so.
Steve Jobs would have approved of that policy. Criticized by some for his refusal to permit any apps on the iPhone that allowed pornography, he defended his position by saying, “You might care more about porn when you have kids. It’s not about freedom, it’s about Apple trying to do the right thing for its users.”
The iPod story spawned a question that I’ve never been asked, but has been asked of most everyone with white earbuds: “What’s on your iPod?” When she asked President George W. Bush what was on his iPod in 2005, Elizabeth Burmiller reported in the New York Times that he had selections from traditional country music singers including Bush favorites by Van Morrison and John Fogerty. A Rolling Stone editor analyzed Bush’s selections and commented, “One thing that’s interesting is that the president likes artists who don’t like him.”
Someone said that simply handing over your iPod to another opens you up like a book, that your musical selections define not just what you like, but who you are. If that is true, I am Steve Jobs. Or at least we have the same taste in music.
Steve Jobs’ iPod was heavy in Bob Dylan albums, his hero, and also the Bealtles. He had songs from seven Beatle albums, including A Hard Day’s Night, Abbey Road, Help!, Let It Be, Magical Mystery Tour, Meet The Beatles! and Sgt. Pepper’s Loney Hearts Club Band. The Rolling Stones were represented, as were many sixties artists such as Aretha, B.B. King, Buddy Holly, Buffalo Springfield, Don McLean, Donavan, The Doors, Janis Joplin, Jefferson Airplane, Jimi Hendrix, Johnny Cash, John Mellencamp, Simon and Garfunkel, and even The Monkees and Sam the Sham. Show your age — if you’re not at least fifty, you’ve probably never heard of some of those artists.
As he neared death, Steve Jobs thought more of getting older and his birth, as many people do. One of his favorite artists was Joni Mitchell, who put up her daughter for adoption and wrote the song, “Little Green,” about her little girl. He played Joni Mitchell’s greatest song, “Both Sides Now,” with its lyrics about being older and wiser: “I’ve looked at life from both sides now/From win and lose, and still somehow/ It’s life’s illusions I recall/ I really don’t know life at all.” She had recorded that song many years apart, first in 1969, and then ‘an excruciatingly haunting slow version” in 2000. Playing the latter version, Jobs noted, “It’s interesting how people age.”
I agree.
Perhaps when I am freed, I can ask Steve Jobs’ widow, Laurene Powell, to download a copy of his iPod playlist, since we thought so much alike.
By the way, what’s on your iPod?
Charlie
Monday, January 16, 2012
“Ye of Little Faith:” The Lost Boys Christmas Party Follow Up
Dateline: January 10, 2012
The response to the December essay about Christmas in prison surprised me. Something about the experience touched more than a few people. I am grateful for the positive comments and encouragement, and want to follow up on how the event turned out.
One of the crucial ways of developing Christmas spirit in the negative environment of prison is through singing Christmas carols. Only a few people have radios in here, which have poor reception and limited pick up out here in the middle of nowhere, so if you want music you have to make your own. Two weeks before Christmas, I’d only enlisted two carolers, but I wasn’t worried. Getting them to sing a few Christmas carols every night as practice was the hard part. As the men heard the songs over a two week period, more and more began humming the tunes, subtly infusing them with Christmas spirit.
When I first went around the housing unit ─ we call them, “dorms,” but the term has nothing else in common with college housing ─ a number of prisoners, the “haves,” quickly signed on, agreeing to participate. A minority of scoffers and doubters ─ mostly “have-nots,” but some “haves,” said they weren’t interested. I told them they were welcome to share in the food and celebration, whether they contributed or not. Prisoners are distrustful. They’ve been conned, lied to and tricked so many times, and have conned, lied to and tricked others in turn, to the point where they look on anything that sounds good with suspicion and skepticism. That’s okay. I’ve learned how to deal with the hard cases.
Two days before Christmas, five men ─ “haves” ─ had made major commitments to purchase canteen food to feed the dorm, but it only works if more prisoners contribute, even if it is only a ramen noodle soup or some saltines. On Friday night, two major contributors and I went from bunk to bunk with a mesh bag seeking donations from the fence sitters.
“Is this thing really gonna go down?” one asked.
“I don’t think it will work, but I’ll throw in a bag of beans and rice,” another said. “Thanks.”
“Man, I ain’t got nothing to give.”
“That’s okay. It’s Christmas. We’ll have something or everyone, even if it isn’t much.”
“I don’t believe in Christmas. This is just a scam.”
“No, it’s not.”
So it went. We collected a surprising amount of food, mostly the dry ramen noodles, beans, and cheese puffs, but also tuna fish, chili and beans, and beef stew in the bag. It still wasn’t enough to feed eighty-five men on Christmas night. When one man said that, I told him they told Jesus the same thing two thousand years ago, right before He fed the multitude with a few fishes and loaves, and we would feed everybody in the building even if it was only a spoonful of tuna salad on a saltine. As it turned out, we had a lot more than that.
One man brought three bags of instant coffee and gave out spoons of coffee to all who wanted it, all Christmas day. Coffee is a big deal in prison. Most men drink it, but most don’t have any. Anyone who buys a bag quickly learns to say no, or risk finding himself bum-rushed by beggars who will drink his last cupful if he lets them. To drink several cups throughout the day without the guilt of having to ask someone if they could spare a spoon “until my money come in from home,” knowing none is coming, was truly a welcome Christmas gift to many “have-nots.”
Several men who couldn’t contribute food offered their labor in preparation. Sixty packs of the ramen noodles and other dry ingredients went into a large plastic bag. That wasn’t going to be enough. A few men got the Christmas spirit, went to the canteen, and came back with more supplies. Into the bag. Add gallons of hot water. Mix it all together. Get the choir organized and singing Christmas carols, the louder the better. All it takes is one spark to get a fire going. Men began drifting over to see how it was coming. Mattresses had been rolled back so the steel bunks could be used as prep areas. Old newspapers were laid down to contain the mess. The carolers sang on. The food was ready.
Most everyone got out their bowls and spoons and lined up. In prison we know how to line up. The chow line, the canteen line, the mail line, the laundry line, the line to go to work, to go to medical, to the chapel. Everywhere is a line. Hurry up and wait. Someone once suggested that the judge should just say, “I sentence you to life standing in line,” and get it over with.
We didn’t know how far the food would go, so the first time through, the bowls were only half filled. Then they came back through a second time. After several Christmas songs, a lively rendition of “Jingle Bells” broke through the tough guy façades, and the singing got boisterous with more people joining in. Several men stayed off to the side, trying to ignore the celebration, but the Christmas spirit was contagious, and the other men went to them.
“Don’t you want something to eat?”
“It’s really good. Where’s your bowl? Try a little.”
Some people have to be convinced it’s okay to have fun and share with others. It’s a good thing we set some aside for the singers, or there would have been little left after a couple of dozen men went through the line a fourth time. I went through twice myself and was full.
One of the scoffers came to me later and said that he’d served nine years in prison, and this was the best Christmas he’d ever had, even on the street. He thanked me for talking him into it, getting him involved, and for putting it all together. That was thanks enough for me. To see so many normally scowling, angry and unhappy men laughing and singing “Joy To The World,” eating and sharing with others, getting along, not arguing, made all the effort worthwhile. I wanted to prove a point ─ that we could rise above our circumstances if we worked together. Point proved. Let us show them what “faith-based” means.
A twenty year old prisoner approached me hesitantly. TWENTY years old! Was I ever that young? He looked fourteen. I shuddered to think of the hell he’d gone through, being sent to an adult prison as a teenager. “Tender vittles,” they call those boys. You’d better fight, and learn to “wear an ass-
whuppin,’ ” to keep your manhood and self-respect in such an environment. I added it up ─ when he was born, I was serving my thirteenth year in prison at Polk C.I., working in the chapel, painting, writing, and growing flowers, besides my other duties. He could have been my grandson. He called me Mr. Norman.
“Mr. Norman,” he said, eyes averted. I waited him out. He looked up at me. “Could I see that picture you took again?”
The previous week, Libby and I had taken a photo in front of the Christmas tree in the visiting park. I had showed it to several fellows when I came back, so they could see how nice the Christmas tree looked, since few of them would be going for a visit.
“Sure.” I got it out and handed it to him. He looked at it for about a minute.
“That’s a good picture of you, Mr. Norman. You look happy.”
“It’s good to have someone who loves you.”
“I don’t have anybody who loves me,” he said, eyes downcast again.
“Surely someone loves you,” I said. “What about your mother?”
“You don’t know my mother. Leave her out of this,” he said. “You know, I never had a Christmas. We didn’t do that. But, today, this Christmas party and all that, the singing, it made me feel different, like someone cares.”
“I care.”
“Thanks.”
He walked away.
Charlie
The response to the December essay about Christmas in prison surprised me. Something about the experience touched more than a few people. I am grateful for the positive comments and encouragement, and want to follow up on how the event turned out.
One of the crucial ways of developing Christmas spirit in the negative environment of prison is through singing Christmas carols. Only a few people have radios in here, which have poor reception and limited pick up out here in the middle of nowhere, so if you want music you have to make your own. Two weeks before Christmas, I’d only enlisted two carolers, but I wasn’t worried. Getting them to sing a few Christmas carols every night as practice was the hard part. As the men heard the songs over a two week period, more and more began humming the tunes, subtly infusing them with Christmas spirit.
When I first went around the housing unit ─ we call them, “dorms,” but the term has nothing else in common with college housing ─ a number of prisoners, the “haves,” quickly signed on, agreeing to participate. A minority of scoffers and doubters ─ mostly “have-nots,” but some “haves,” said they weren’t interested. I told them they were welcome to share in the food and celebration, whether they contributed or not. Prisoners are distrustful. They’ve been conned, lied to and tricked so many times, and have conned, lied to and tricked others in turn, to the point where they look on anything that sounds good with suspicion and skepticism. That’s okay. I’ve learned how to deal with the hard cases.
Two days before Christmas, five men ─ “haves” ─ had made major commitments to purchase canteen food to feed the dorm, but it only works if more prisoners contribute, even if it is only a ramen noodle soup or some saltines. On Friday night, two major contributors and I went from bunk to bunk with a mesh bag seeking donations from the fence sitters.
“Is this thing really gonna go down?” one asked.
“I don’t think it will work, but I’ll throw in a bag of beans and rice,” another said. “Thanks.”
“Man, I ain’t got nothing to give.”
“That’s okay. It’s Christmas. We’ll have something or everyone, even if it isn’t much.”
“I don’t believe in Christmas. This is just a scam.”
“No, it’s not.”
So it went. We collected a surprising amount of food, mostly the dry ramen noodles, beans, and cheese puffs, but also tuna fish, chili and beans, and beef stew in the bag. It still wasn’t enough to feed eighty-five men on Christmas night. When one man said that, I told him they told Jesus the same thing two thousand years ago, right before He fed the multitude with a few fishes and loaves, and we would feed everybody in the building even if it was only a spoonful of tuna salad on a saltine. As it turned out, we had a lot more than that.
One man brought three bags of instant coffee and gave out spoons of coffee to all who wanted it, all Christmas day. Coffee is a big deal in prison. Most men drink it, but most don’t have any. Anyone who buys a bag quickly learns to say no, or risk finding himself bum-rushed by beggars who will drink his last cupful if he lets them. To drink several cups throughout the day without the guilt of having to ask someone if they could spare a spoon “until my money come in from home,” knowing none is coming, was truly a welcome Christmas gift to many “have-nots.”
Several men who couldn’t contribute food offered their labor in preparation. Sixty packs of the ramen noodles and other dry ingredients went into a large plastic bag. That wasn’t going to be enough. A few men got the Christmas spirit, went to the canteen, and came back with more supplies. Into the bag. Add gallons of hot water. Mix it all together. Get the choir organized and singing Christmas carols, the louder the better. All it takes is one spark to get a fire going. Men began drifting over to see how it was coming. Mattresses had been rolled back so the steel bunks could be used as prep areas. Old newspapers were laid down to contain the mess. The carolers sang on. The food was ready.
Most everyone got out their bowls and spoons and lined up. In prison we know how to line up. The chow line, the canteen line, the mail line, the laundry line, the line to go to work, to go to medical, to the chapel. Everywhere is a line. Hurry up and wait. Someone once suggested that the judge should just say, “I sentence you to life standing in line,” and get it over with.
We didn’t know how far the food would go, so the first time through, the bowls were only half filled. Then they came back through a second time. After several Christmas songs, a lively rendition of “Jingle Bells” broke through the tough guy façades, and the singing got boisterous with more people joining in. Several men stayed off to the side, trying to ignore the celebration, but the Christmas spirit was contagious, and the other men went to them.
“Don’t you want something to eat?”
“It’s really good. Where’s your bowl? Try a little.”
Some people have to be convinced it’s okay to have fun and share with others. It’s a good thing we set some aside for the singers, or there would have been little left after a couple of dozen men went through the line a fourth time. I went through twice myself and was full.
One of the scoffers came to me later and said that he’d served nine years in prison, and this was the best Christmas he’d ever had, even on the street. He thanked me for talking him into it, getting him involved, and for putting it all together. That was thanks enough for me. To see so many normally scowling, angry and unhappy men laughing and singing “Joy To The World,” eating and sharing with others, getting along, not arguing, made all the effort worthwhile. I wanted to prove a point ─ that we could rise above our circumstances if we worked together. Point proved. Let us show them what “faith-based” means.
A twenty year old prisoner approached me hesitantly. TWENTY years old! Was I ever that young? He looked fourteen. I shuddered to think of the hell he’d gone through, being sent to an adult prison as a teenager. “Tender vittles,” they call those boys. You’d better fight, and learn to “wear an ass-
whuppin,’ ” to keep your manhood and self-respect in such an environment. I added it up ─ when he was born, I was serving my thirteenth year in prison at Polk C.I., working in the chapel, painting, writing, and growing flowers, besides my other duties. He could have been my grandson. He called me Mr. Norman.
“Mr. Norman,” he said, eyes averted. I waited him out. He looked up at me. “Could I see that picture you took again?”
The previous week, Libby and I had taken a photo in front of the Christmas tree in the visiting park. I had showed it to several fellows when I came back, so they could see how nice the Christmas tree looked, since few of them would be going for a visit.
“Sure.” I got it out and handed it to him. He looked at it for about a minute.
“That’s a good picture of you, Mr. Norman. You look happy.”
“It’s good to have someone who loves you.”
“I don’t have anybody who loves me,” he said, eyes downcast again.
“Surely someone loves you,” I said. “What about your mother?”
“You don’t know my mother. Leave her out of this,” he said. “You know, I never had a Christmas. We didn’t do that. But, today, this Christmas party and all that, the singing, it made me feel different, like someone cares.”
“I care.”
“Thanks.”
He walked away.
Charlie
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