Civil Rights And Word Counts

I'm supposed to be writing right now.

I've been staring at a blank screen for the last twenty minutes.

An old documentary about the struggle for Mississippi voting rights is on channel 24.

There is only so much to do here: sit in your CELL, walk in tiny circles on the fenced-in BLACKTOP in front of the unit, or stand in the crowded LOBBY downstairs. It takes all of 45 minutes to get tired of doing one, or any combination of the three.

A parade of black women are marching down the street. A row of haggard white cops gripping their batons line both sides of the street. 

I've been at this facility almost two years to the day. It's the fifth facility I've been to in the past eight years. It is by far the worst.

It's supposed to be a Level 1 facility—minimum security—only I can't figure out how. Granted, it's the only level 1 I've been to, but simple logic would suggest that an inmate would be allotted MORE freedom in a lower level, not LESS. This is not the case here at the Parnall Correctional Facility.

The women have stopped marching. A police car has halted their advance. A crowd begins to swell around the cruiser.

The first three years of my sentence were spent in Level 4 maximum security facilities. 22-hour-a-day lockdown. And as fucked up as life might've been in those higher levels, at least it made some sense—albeit in a twisted sort of way. It might not have been much, but you knew what you had coming. You could stitch together a mental map that was at least partially based on common sense.

Not here.

The documentary crew is interviewing one of the marchers. The original black and white footage of the protest looks to be sixty—maybe seventy years old. The interview footage is newer but still old. The lady being interviewed has aged well. I recognize her from the march. She was the first one to the cop car. She has these beautiful white teeth the size of piano keys. She's lost none of her spark in the ensuing years.

One of the best parts of moving from a Max to a Medium security facility is the ability to interact with inmates from other housing units. Freedom of choice. In Max you're not only limited to the inmates in your particular housing unit, but to your individual wing of the housing unit. A 49-person pool of convicted felons in which to find someone worth sending your time with. It's more of a puddle than a pool. You're lucky to find one—maybe two inmates you can tolerate for the two hours a day you're allowed out of your cell. But step on to a Level 2 medium security facility and, just like that, your 49-person puddle becomes a 1700-person Olympic-sized swimming pool. And Level 2s have what's called "Freedom of Movement". It means that other than lockdown at night, and the two daily count times, you're free to move about the compound with relative immunity.

The cops are breaking up the march. A black woman is being dragged by her feet towards a paddy wagon.

In Level 2s the back-forty (the common yard) is always packed. It's where everyone meets up. It's where everything happens. Different parts of the back-forty produce their own gravitational fields. Groups of varying size fall into their natural orbits around the available amenities. Foursomes gather around the old wooden picnic tables, teams of three-on-three bounce around basketball courts, doubles rotate in the weigh pit, and individual inmates pull and push themselves on the bars of the ancient exercise stations placed strategically around the yard. And the softball field is at the center of it all. Even without a game being played the bleachers are dotted with lounging inmates. They sip coffee, hold court, and play spades on any unused stretch of bench seat. Usually one of the old heads will bring a radio out—a radio with an actual speaker—a radio we haven't been allowed to order for more than twenty years now. Before too long everyone is nodding along or tapping their foot in rhythmic unison—even if they're not aware they're doing so.

I miss that gravity.

And these Level 2 freedoms weren't just relegated to the back forty. There was board-game night in the chowhall on Wednesdays, sign language classes in the school building, personal gardens, softball leagues, religious services, library, yoga classes—all integrated. These tiny facsimiles of freedom are the ONLY institutional carrots to chase. An incentive to stay out of trouble—to stay out of Max. And it all made sense—at least that part did.

And then came Parnall.

Throughout my bid I'd heard rumors about the minimum security facilities. That they were rife with young dummies doing the brash shit that comes with baby bids. I never wanted to go to a level 1. If it was up to me I would've paroled from a level 2—with the Lifers who know how to Jail. Nothing like a swath of killers to keep everything on the up and up. Alas, my location wasn't up to me. Few things in here ever are.

Another black woman is jabbed with a baton until she's folded into the back of a cop car.

When I was finally waived to a level 1—two years early I might add—I was sick with dread. I'd expected to have two more years to further prepare myself for the inevitable nonsense of an incarcerated population on the verge of freedom. So much for expectations. While I was packing my things I forced myself to acknowledge the silver linings this pain-in-the-ass move would provide. 1: I'd be one step closer to the door. And 2: at least I would have more freedom.

Or so I assumed.

At this new facility—for some unknown reason that has nothing to do with covid—interaction with inmates from other housing units is strictly prohibited. About a year ago they ran a fence through the middle of the common area in front of the nine and ten block housing units. A 48th parallel. No explanation. Confused inmates would gather at the fence to talk to their now exiled comrades. So they put up anther fence parallel to the first fence with a six foot dead zone between them. A few weeks later they dropped massive concrete blocks in the dead zone. Another few weeks, once they realized inmates were still talking to each other across the demilitarized zone—they brought out buckets of bright yellow paint and rolled out lines that stretched the distance between us another ten feet. Even in Max we were allowed to stand at a fence and talk to inmates from other units. 

The protest has reached the steps of what looks like a courthouse.

And lest you think these restrictive measures were an attempt to prevent the spread of covid. They are not. I wish this were the case. You'll just have to take my word for it. There is no pandemic explanation.

The group of women walk up the steps. One of them leads her son by the hand. They disappear into the building.

I guess what's most maddening is that they have the nerve to call this place a minimum security facility. And everyone who works here struts around with a shit-eating grin as if this is all normal—as if they don't owe anyone an explanation.

Sodium meet festering gash.

The women exit the courthouse. This time they're smiling and waving tiny American flags. The police are standing off to the side of the doors.

This whole thing is futile. I get exhausted just thinking about the word count it would take to adequately explain all the ways this place is fucked. You'd have to know what prison is like—what it's supposed to be like at every different level—the mental and psychological nuances of losing your autonomy for nearly a decade. Feels like too much work to make you understand.

An old black and white scene of a white cop trying to yank an American flag away from the little black kid coming out of the court house. The kid can't be more than seven years old. He almost has his arm yanked out of its socket before he lets go of the flag.

This place has done it's best to wear me down over the years—to beat the expectation of reason or logic out of me. At some point you have to give up trying to make sense of it all and just surrender to the maddening.

As soon as the cops pries the flag loose he tosses it to the ground. The bastard didn't even want it. He just didn't want the kid to have it.

So this is my life at a minimum security facility—eternally frustrated and pining for the ironic freedom of a higher level—hunched over my desk finally writing—even if it'll never see the light of day—watching a documentary about American oppression, with the same three options everyday: cell, blacktop, or lobby.

Tonight I chose my cell.

It makes me feel slightly better to think that the cop is long dead by now. Then I realize that the kid is still black, and living in Mississippi during Jim Crow. It's just as likely the cop out lived the kid.

Tomorrow I might head out to the blacktop and walk in circles—but I won't like it.

It worries my to think how little things change.