Since Ani is in segregation, and I haven't heard from him for awhile, I decided to use his blog for a bit of a rant.
I remember when the judge sentenced him in 2002 that she gave a very brief nod to the concept that if he were younger she might consider suggestions for evaluation and treatment. This sense that something is "too late" and therefore the only thing we can do is to lock him up for basically the rest of his life, riles me. How can something be "too late" when you were never offered it in the first place? What is "too late"? Has the train left the station? Has the doctor gone home for the day? Is there not another day, another train?
There seems to me to be something monumentally cruel in telling someone it is too late to allow them to learn, to grow, to find out what they can do to make things better. Ani is a slow learner and a late developer in some areas. He is grappling with how to make decisions by thinking through options and consequences rather than acting without thought. I don't know how much he can develop this ability, but I would never discourage his desire by telling him "it is too late" or "that ship has sailed" or "that's water over the dam." Do we send people to prison to "think about what they've done" or do we do so to lock them up forever so we don't have to think about them? How many people actually give any thought to what happens to people when our judges, on our behalf, give out sentences that give up on a person?
The bitter part of it being "too late" for Ani is that we are just for the first time learning what may have been the cause for many of his difficulties and we are attempting to get this evaluated. For a variety of reasons, this was never done before. If there is something going on that caused him to have difficulty in several areas, it offers hope to find that out and see what can be offered to him to deal with this. This seems to be all about hope and possibility, learning and growth...and yet the judge acted on her belief that it was all "too late" for Ani.
It has been a fragile thing to offer hope to Ani. For as long as he can remember, he has been offered shame and punishment whenever he failed to live up to the expectations of others. He was told over and over that he was lazy or he didn't care or he wasn't trying hard enough - that the thing being expected of him was within his power to do. And then, over and over he was heaped with scorn and rejection, blame and punishment when things didn't work out the way others had expected. He came to have a deathly fear of all expectations. Our recent sojourn into the land of neuroscience has been frought with anxiety for the possiblity of hope, the possiblity that things might not always have been his fault, and the possiblity that upon learning where he is having difficulty there might be something that could make things work better. Dang those expectations!
So, in spite of the judge's pronouncement that life was pretty much over for Ani, and no one would be making any more expectations of him, I have labored to help him find answers. In my mind, prison is - or should be - about learning to take responsibility, learning to act in a way that changes things and makes them better. However, I have found very very little of that going on in prison and I wonder if it explains why there is such a high recidivism rate. It is really a dangerous thing, in my mind, to lock people up without giving them the tools to make changes, as it is bound to actually make them worse.
Taking responsibility, I believe, starts with knowing what you are capable of, what is within your power to do. If we take responsibility for something we have no power over, it kind of messes up our sense of responsibility. Likewise, if we believe we are powerless when there actually is something we can do, we have warped our sense of responsibility. I hope I am not being naive in my belief that an evaluation will help Ani to learn more about what he is capable of doing, and what he is not capable of at this time. And, that this will form the basis for a truer sense of responsibility.
Ani's last letter also addressed his current state of understanding on this issue, making the following request of me:
"On my next worksheet series I would like to work on my decision making abilities. I should point out this is a biggie. Even though I know what I'm supposed to do I more often than not will do what I want to do. Its a terrible habit for me to break. Nothing works. Not logic, reason, beatings, or Prison; I'm incorrigible. I would like to be corrigible."
I agree that there is something very impaired in his decision making abilities. I am encouraged by his growing awareness of this fact. I am hopeful that with the help of some professionals that we are hoping to be able to bring into the prison to evaluate him, we will know more about what isn't working. And then comes the possibility of growth and change. Much better to be here than to be left at the station watching the train of life departing with just about everyone else on it.
Happy New Year!
Jackie
Friday, December 31, 2010
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
Birthday Greetings
(with an intro and closing by Jackie)
Ani's last post was written while he was in segregation. He got out in early November, after about 50 days and was in GP or "general population" for about 6 weeks. I noticed that he seemed to be taking some time in adjusting to the stresses of adapting to a new cellmate and to the demands of his neighbors on his tier. He was just talking about being ready to send a new post to his blog.
Then, on December 16th, when he was coming back to his cell from a meal, he was given something folded up in a wad of toilet paper by the tier tender (a tier tender is an inmate job), and told to deliver it to another inmate when he went up to the library the next morning. He put it in his pocket and before he could decide what to do about it he was stopped by a guard, asked what he had in his pocket, and his cell was searched. Once again, they found a few items of contraband in his cell (although not in his personal property), and when he handed over what he had just put in his pocket, it turned out to be 3 pills in a salt packet. The pills were clonidine, a prescription medication used to treat high blood pressure. (I looked it up.) He was whisked back to "the hole" and has been in solitary confinement since then, waiting for his "ticket" to be heard. Since tickets are only heard on Fridays, and the next two Fridays will be holidays, it looks like he won't have his ticket heard until January 7. That means he will have served 3 weeks before his sentence even starts, since the sentence doesn't start until the day it is given at the hearing.
So, unfortunately, Ani was in segregation for his birthday on December 24, and for Christmas. He wrote me a letter on his birthday, and I thought I would share parts of it with whomever might be reading...
"12-24-2010
"Hey! It's my birthday! I can't imagine a day coming where I won't be absof*inglutely thrilled by my birthday. Can't imagine it. I do hope that a day comes where life will be better, but for now this is pretty good... I woke up and my mind went immediately to my conduct report. I was unhappy because it was written in such a way as to appear that I named names. But then I saw a fruit fly while I was brushing my teeth. I've, for mysterious reason unknown to even myself, always like fruit flys. So I asked it a question and if by way of the universe answering it flew up and landed very close to my mirror on the wall. I was looking at myself and I knew that I was going to be alright....
"I do look forward to book day - new books to read. So I was eagerly anticipating the moment when I heard the book cart trundling down the hallway. He stops at my door, opens my trap and gives me three books. What the hell?! They ain't the books I ordered, in fact the CO gave me my neighbors book order. The CO looks on the cart and no books! I'm...unhappy. But the CO (an all around decent fellow) says, "fill another order out" and he'll go fill it and bring them on the med cart. Wow. And he does it! Ha! And I got my first three choices - which never happens! Joyz! So I got a cooool b-day gift from the universe. Thank you universe. So I have two big fat James Michener novels, Texas and Hawaii as well as the fourth book in the Earth's Children series by Jean Auel, The Plains of Passage. So that's 3317 pages to read in a week if you're interested. Right now Hawaii is first up. The book begins with a king getting brained and anytime a book begins with royalty getting their brains beat out - well, that's an okay book to me!
"...do you want to know what my favorite word in the whole world is? It's not love, or peace, or money (but them's all cool). It's not toys (dear to my hearts), or even Jackie (but its nearly neck and neck!). My favorite word in the whole wide world is: ...wait for it... FLUEGELHORN! That word just makes me chuckle/snort/giggle and fills me with the urge to dance (sucker!) and shout it at the top of my lungs.
FLUEGELHORN
"Yes, I'm being silly but for the first time in a week I feel like me again. Sure, I made a bad choice but I can recover. My reputation might take a hit but I think I'll be okay. ... I'll just disappear into the belly of this concrete beast for a few months...and then I'll be burped up like a bit of undigested pot roast, ready for my next adventure!"
(end of Ani's letter) It never ceases to amaze me how he can let things like this slide off his back and come up grinning. Sure, he's been dealing with set-backs and losses all of his life so I suppose he has developed a knack of some kind that most of the rest of us simply don't have. And, if you don't really have any plans or expectations, you don't get bent out of shape when they are foiled. I can't decide if his way of looking at life is something to be sorry for or wish I had!
We've no pictures this year like last Christmas. Please feel free to share your own with us!!
Season's Greetings and Best Wishes to all Readers,
Jackie
Ani's last post was written while he was in segregation. He got out in early November, after about 50 days and was in GP or "general population" for about 6 weeks. I noticed that he seemed to be taking some time in adjusting to the stresses of adapting to a new cellmate and to the demands of his neighbors on his tier. He was just talking about being ready to send a new post to his blog.
Then, on December 16th, when he was coming back to his cell from a meal, he was given something folded up in a wad of toilet paper by the tier tender (a tier tender is an inmate job), and told to deliver it to another inmate when he went up to the library the next morning. He put it in his pocket and before he could decide what to do about it he was stopped by a guard, asked what he had in his pocket, and his cell was searched. Once again, they found a few items of contraband in his cell (although not in his personal property), and when he handed over what he had just put in his pocket, it turned out to be 3 pills in a salt packet. The pills were clonidine, a prescription medication used to treat high blood pressure. (I looked it up.) He was whisked back to "the hole" and has been in solitary confinement since then, waiting for his "ticket" to be heard. Since tickets are only heard on Fridays, and the next two Fridays will be holidays, it looks like he won't have his ticket heard until January 7. That means he will have served 3 weeks before his sentence even starts, since the sentence doesn't start until the day it is given at the hearing.
So, unfortunately, Ani was in segregation for his birthday on December 24, and for Christmas. He wrote me a letter on his birthday, and I thought I would share parts of it with whomever might be reading...
"12-24-2010
"Hey! It's my birthday! I can't imagine a day coming where I won't be absof*inglutely thrilled by my birthday. Can't imagine it. I do hope that a day comes where life will be better, but for now this is pretty good... I woke up and my mind went immediately to my conduct report. I was unhappy because it was written in such a way as to appear that I named names. But then I saw a fruit fly while I was brushing my teeth. I've, for mysterious reason unknown to even myself, always like fruit flys. So I asked it a question and if by way of the universe answering it flew up and landed very close to my mirror on the wall. I was looking at myself and I knew that I was going to be alright....
"I do look forward to book day - new books to read. So I was eagerly anticipating the moment when I heard the book cart trundling down the hallway. He stops at my door, opens my trap and gives me three books. What the hell?! They ain't the books I ordered, in fact the CO gave me my neighbors book order. The CO looks on the cart and no books! I'm...unhappy. But the CO (an all around decent fellow) says, "fill another order out" and he'll go fill it and bring them on the med cart. Wow. And he does it! Ha! And I got my first three choices - which never happens! Joyz! So I got a cooool b-day gift from the universe. Thank you universe. So I have two big fat James Michener novels, Texas and Hawaii as well as the fourth book in the Earth's Children series by Jean Auel, The Plains of Passage. So that's 3317 pages to read in a week if you're interested. Right now Hawaii is first up. The book begins with a king getting brained and anytime a book begins with royalty getting their brains beat out - well, that's an okay book to me!
"...do you want to know what my favorite word in the whole world is? It's not love, or peace, or money (but them's all cool). It's not toys (dear to my hearts), or even Jackie (but its nearly neck and neck!). My favorite word in the whole wide world is: ...wait for it... FLUEGELHORN! That word just makes me chuckle/snort/giggle and fills me with the urge to dance (sucker!) and shout it at the top of my lungs.
FLUEGELHORN
"Yes, I'm being silly but for the first time in a week I feel like me again. Sure, I made a bad choice but I can recover. My reputation might take a hit but I think I'll be okay. ... I'll just disappear into the belly of this concrete beast for a few months...and then I'll be burped up like a bit of undigested pot roast, ready for my next adventure!"
(end of Ani's letter) It never ceases to amaze me how he can let things like this slide off his back and come up grinning. Sure, he's been dealing with set-backs and losses all of his life so I suppose he has developed a knack of some kind that most of the rest of us simply don't have. And, if you don't really have any plans or expectations, you don't get bent out of shape when they are foiled. I can't decide if his way of looking at life is something to be sorry for or wish I had!
We've no pictures this year like last Christmas. Please feel free to share your own with us!!
Season's Greetings and Best Wishes to all Readers,
Jackie
Saturday, October 2, 2010
In the Belly of the Beast - Part 2
THE PICTURE OF MY CELL (in the previous post) is looking from the head of my bed/desk. On the sink are 2 bars of Next 1 moisturizing soap. On the top of the sink are (left to right) two tubes of toothpaste: the skinny one on the left is state-issued, the other is canteen purchased. A stubby toothbrush - all the better to not stab you with. A tube of chapstick and my deoderant. The bricks are all wrong - perspective problems - and the floor should be mottled. I can pace six paces from the corner by the door to the corner by my desk. Light on upper right.On the one hand, although Jackie compliments me for not blaming anyone but myself for getting in here, there are thousands I want to blame! Ha! Yes, I had all that stuff but that being said, the CO is still an a**hole. Not to blame him - he did his job to be sure. Yet I think it was a bit of a pissy petty ticket.
On the other hand, I'm mad that I let myself get complacent, thinking I wasn't doing all that much wrong. I mean seriously, a baggie of garlic powder?! I guess that's a big caper to these people. What it really was was enough rope to hang myself. The most serious charge is the gambling. I was in a pool - told myself that since I wasn't going to run one what was the harm of being in a pool? Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. So now I start off new again. No job, no income, no recreation, no visits, no phone, no shoes. I threw myself down the hole again. Okay - I am sick of it. but I don't know if I like my future free of all VICE. I don't know why it fears me so. Like I'm a loser if I'm all rule abiding. I'll be what I dispise - a drone. They will have won; I will be tamed, owned, brought to heel before people I dispise. Now I'll be a fort Indian waiting to put my mark on the paper so I can get my bottle of liquor and a ratty-ass blanket. I'm so pissed. I have to look at the smug face of some grotty pig knowing that he will always have the upper hand. It just bothers me. Because of it I can't not be self destructive.
(from a letter to Jackie written 9-24-1010)
In The Belly of the Beast
Over this last summer I watched somewhat interestedly while BP futzed around in the Gulf of Mexico with their runaway well. As I watched them attempt the thousandth "kill" (let's see, there was Top Kill, Static Kill, Bottom Kill, Side Kill, Kill Kill and Gee I Wish I Could Kill Kill) I was struck by a comment one of the engineers made: There was no situation that they couldn't make worse. Now that was a proverbial bolt from the blue. It was as if someone had put to word the very essence of my life!
I must now announce that I have found yet another way to make my situation worse: I am back in Segregation. *Boo!* To put it bluntly, I was found to be in possession of the following items, which according to the Powers that Be posed a serious risk of disruption to the security of the institution. To wit: 3 pornographic photos (color), a small baggie of garlic powder, some leftover electrical tape, a gambling information sheet, and some fantasy role-playing material/papers.
Normally at this point I would begin my ranting and raving at the injustice of it all, at the small-minded pettiness of the system and its drones, and what not and what for, ad nauseum. But not today, not this time. Yes, I had those things in my possession. My bad. What I was left with was wondering whether that motley assortment of contraband was worth 45 days up on the hill getting focused, or the loss of my tutoring position, the loss of all of my 14 months of seniority (the time elapsed since I was last in the grip). No, I don't think it was. Hindsight being what it is, I can't say I came out ahead in the transaction. On the other hand, I'm not sure that I'd change all that much. I had a nice discussion with the hearing officer that not only surprised me with his humanity (!) but certainly raised my opinion of him. I told him that I was, indeed, gambling on NFL football games; it helped to brighten a dreary grey existence. I had some, yes, garlic powder from the kitchen to make my food taste better, and the reason I had the "pornography" was because I had 50 years to do and I didn't want to forget what a woman looks like. He surprised me when he said, "Good answer, good answer." I knew he had a job to do and he had to do what he had to do, yet I was struck by his understanding of what motivates me. I didn't bullshit him, I didn't see the point.
Was it worth it? More importantly, would I do the same things again, knowing the potential outcome. No, probably not but I say that with some trepidation. I will give up the gambling on football; the Bi-valve Butcher says that that was what they were looking for in retribution for having skated on a previous gambling ticket. That makes sense. The seasonings and the photos I'd probably risk again. The hearing officer admitted that the "theft" (of seasoning) was "miniscule" and I think I made my case for the photos. All in all, I think it was a wash. There were some technical violations of the rules and some not so technical and I don't feel that I was chewed up too badly by the machine. I'll miss the job and the paycheck, but I wasn't supposed to have either anyways, so I feel I stole $500 from them, I guess.
If anyone is wondering what I've learned from this experience, I can only imagine your disappointment. I've learned that a particular CO, a tiny frustrated bitter man, can carry a grudge for quite awhile. I learned that an executioner can be empathetic all the while lopping off your head. I learned that wagering on the NFL is a sin and not a victimless crime. Oh yes, that seasonings are for the masses and not the individual. And that I can live a life, bleak in its colorlessness and flavorlessness, but still retain my dignity and humor. In a few short weeks I'll descend from my self-imposed exile to jostle with stink of felons, shake-up with my Brothers, laugh and mock and turn another day.
I must now announce that I have found yet another way to make my situation worse: I am back in Segregation. *Boo!* To put it bluntly, I was found to be in possession of the following items, which according to the Powers that Be posed a serious risk of disruption to the security of the institution. To wit: 3 pornographic photos (color), a small baggie of garlic powder, some leftover electrical tape, a gambling information sheet, and some fantasy role-playing material/papers.
Normally at this point I would begin my ranting and raving at the injustice of it all, at the small-minded pettiness of the system and its drones, and what not and what for, ad nauseum. But not today, not this time. Yes, I had those things in my possession. My bad. What I was left with was wondering whether that motley assortment of contraband was worth 45 days up on the hill getting focused, or the loss of my tutoring position, the loss of all of my 14 months of seniority (the time elapsed since I was last in the grip). No, I don't think it was. Hindsight being what it is, I can't say I came out ahead in the transaction. On the other hand, I'm not sure that I'd change all that much. I had a nice discussion with the hearing officer that not only surprised me with his humanity (!) but certainly raised my opinion of him. I told him that I was, indeed, gambling on NFL football games; it helped to brighten a dreary grey existence. I had some, yes, garlic powder from the kitchen to make my food taste better, and the reason I had the "pornography" was because I had 50 years to do and I didn't want to forget what a woman looks like. He surprised me when he said, "Good answer, good answer." I knew he had a job to do and he had to do what he had to do, yet I was struck by his understanding of what motivates me. I didn't bullshit him, I didn't see the point.
Was it worth it? More importantly, would I do the same things again, knowing the potential outcome. No, probably not but I say that with some trepidation. I will give up the gambling on football; the Bi-valve Butcher says that that was what they were looking for in retribution for having skated on a previous gambling ticket. That makes sense. The seasonings and the photos I'd probably risk again. The hearing officer admitted that the "theft" (of seasoning) was "miniscule" and I think I made my case for the photos. All in all, I think it was a wash. There were some technical violations of the rules and some not so technical and I don't feel that I was chewed up too badly by the machine. I'll miss the job and the paycheck, but I wasn't supposed to have either anyways, so I feel I stole $500 from them, I guess.
If anyone is wondering what I've learned from this experience, I can only imagine your disappointment. I've learned that a particular CO, a tiny frustrated bitter man, can carry a grudge for quite awhile. I learned that an executioner can be empathetic all the while lopping off your head. I learned that wagering on the NFL is a sin and not a victimless crime. Oh yes, that seasonings are for the masses and not the individual. And that I can live a life, bleak in its colorlessness and flavorlessness, but still retain my dignity and humor. In a few short weeks I'll descend from my self-imposed exile to jostle with stink of felons, shake-up with my Brothers, laugh and mock and turn another day.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
SWEET NECTAR OF THE GODS
Have I mentioned that I love Kool-aid? Well, I do. I'll drink any flavor but I know being pre-diabetic having too much sugar isn't good for me. So what's a guy to do? One of the first things that you learn in the joint is that nearly everything has a price. There is a thriving under-market for anything that we can't buy off of the canteen or can be stolen from the state. The kitchen is one of the primary sources of contraband. We don't get to buy fresh produce to cook with, so we buy fresh onions, green pepper, cheese, ground beef from people willing to risk smuggling it out of food service. Lately, the DOC has been on a "health" kick so they replaced our soda that we used to get with meals with sugar-free Kool-aid. So once a week I pay about the equivalent of three stamped envelopes for a bag of drink mix the size of a small apple. The best is lemonade. The most weird is grape. Grape is the least popular because grape is like a bad party guest. You know the guy gets drunk and pukes on your deck, stumbles into things, and says the most inappropriate stuff. Grape does not play well with other flavors; if you add grape to any other flavor - it all becomes grape. Grape don't know how to act right. I used to caddy at a golf course when I was a shorty, and when we made the turn the golfer for whom you were caddying would buy a grape juice and 7-up concoction. So I got used to the flavor combo. To this day I still mix Diet Sierra Mist with my Kool-aid. Just thought that you'd like to know.
As I Was Saying Before We Were So Rudely Interrupted...
Worst Week. Ever. Part Two
So to recap: I didn't get a new job, the Powers that Be hate me, and to top it all off my cellie went to the hole. Going to segregation isn't that rare of an occurance at WCI. In fact, they lock people up at such a rate, for such petty offenses as not pulling up your pants, not tying your shoes, or (my personal favorite) not standing for count, you would think that the administration is using the disciplinary system for other means. Like as a bargaining chip when their labor union contract comes up for negotiation; i.e. if the seg unit is always full, then this must be an extraordinarily dangerous job - give us more money; the other equally cynical option is that they are using the seg unit as a defacto housing unit and keeping it full of inmates on humbug write-ups that in other joints would be dismissed, warnings, or loss of recreation. Now, I'm not here to complain about how they use their segregation unit (even though I just did); I want to talk about packing up a cellie.
Living in a 6' x 12' cell is never easy under the best circumstances. It's worse when you got years to do and nowhere to go. If you're lucky, and I was, you get a cell mate that you can "jail" with. The best cell-mates have all their own electronics, money, pull their weight when it comes to the chores, a good sense of humor, and don't snitch. So I was unhappy when my cellie got wrote up for loitering on the range, and got seg time. When you go to seg you don't get to pack your own property - it's go directly to jail, do not pass Go, do not collect $200. As I am familiar with this process myself *sigh* I know the value of being tight with your living mate so that none of your stuff comes up missing. So I made sure that all of his things got packed up and what not then I hunkered down to play the "Hey-what-kind-of-hump-can-I-stick-in-your-cell-lottery"! Ah, good times. As of this date I am still doing the solo thing. Knock on wood - wait, there is no wood here. Shit.
For those of you out there that care I'm doing fine. I'm not up to as many shenanigans as I used to be and that is a flippy-flop thing for me. On the one hand, the non-incarcerated people in my life are happier, but on the flip side of that it makes for a very BORING existence. I just got a 12 month defer from the program review committee (PRC), "Hey, why don't you do this program?". "Aaahh, I got yer program right here, buddy." And I'm still teaching grown felons to read, which is from time to time a surreal pleasure.
So to recap: I didn't get a new job, the Powers that Be hate me, and to top it all off my cellie went to the hole. Going to segregation isn't that rare of an occurance at WCI. In fact, they lock people up at such a rate, for such petty offenses as not pulling up your pants, not tying your shoes, or (my personal favorite) not standing for count, you would think that the administration is using the disciplinary system for other means. Like as a bargaining chip when their labor union contract comes up for negotiation; i.e. if the seg unit is always full, then this must be an extraordinarily dangerous job - give us more money; the other equally cynical option is that they are using the seg unit as a defacto housing unit and keeping it full of inmates on humbug write-ups that in other joints would be dismissed, warnings, or loss of recreation. Now, I'm not here to complain about how they use their segregation unit (even though I just did); I want to talk about packing up a cellie.
Living in a 6' x 12' cell is never easy under the best circumstances. It's worse when you got years to do and nowhere to go. If you're lucky, and I was, you get a cell mate that you can "jail" with. The best cell-mates have all their own electronics, money, pull their weight when it comes to the chores, a good sense of humor, and don't snitch. So I was unhappy when my cellie got wrote up for loitering on the range, and got seg time. When you go to seg you don't get to pack your own property - it's go directly to jail, do not pass Go, do not collect $200. As I am familiar with this process myself *sigh* I know the value of being tight with your living mate so that none of your stuff comes up missing. So I made sure that all of his things got packed up and what not then I hunkered down to play the "Hey-what-kind-of-hump-can-I-stick-in-your-cell-lottery"! Ah, good times. As of this date I am still doing the solo thing. Knock on wood - wait, there is no wood here. Shit.
For those of you out there that care I'm doing fine. I'm not up to as many shenanigans as I used to be and that is a flippy-flop thing for me. On the one hand, the non-incarcerated people in my life are happier, but on the flip side of that it makes for a very BORING existence. I just got a 12 month defer from the program review committee (PRC), "Hey, why don't you do this program?". "Aaahh, I got yer program right here, buddy." And I'm still teaching grown felons to read, which is from time to time a surreal pleasure.
Thursday, August 5, 2010
July 25 2010 Worst Week. Ever. - Part One
It occurs to me that no one is ever prepared for the universe defecating upon their heads; I certainly had no inkling that this past week was going to be so profoundly rotten. Not in the sense that anyone died, but just bad from start to finish. I actually began the week with a spark of hope. I had ended last week being offered a job that had several advantages over my current gig of school tutor. I've been trying to wangle a transfer from one cell hall to another as where I am currently housed the waiting list for a single cell approaches two years, or, in my case, another 11 months. Plus the new employment had the advantage of better hours for the same pay with the potential of obtaining a higher pay grade. Perfect, I thought, even though I did have a small worry about the mandatory step of having the security department sign off before I got the job. Even this small item was tempered by the fact that the same security supervisor that originally gave me my current job would be the same one reviewing the paperwork. So you could see why ending the week I was in a pretty good mood.
The first hint that all was not right came that Sunday at sweat lodge. I was talking to another Native that had worked in the same shop that I was trying to get into, and who still had connections there. The word was that when the boss had put my name up he was immediately told that not only was I not going to get the new job, but they (security) had no idea how I got the job I currently have. I, like most of the other people in here, just chuckled and said, "fuck 'em, if that's the way they want to be." What else could I do? I had just been told that my hard work getting my tutor certification and getting immediate employment (with recommendation from my instructor, no less) not to mention the hard work I had put in trying to teach grown men the finer points of comma use and parallel construction was nothing more than a bureaucratic snafu, an institutional hiccup. Ahhh, so bite me.
I guess that I was somewhat crushed though. Not only did I act like some fish ( a person new to the institution) and actually have HOPE, but worse, I thought that you could somehow escape or move beyond your past. I have always had nothing but contempt for people that work in "corrections"; sadists, hypocrits, and inbred mongoloids that were here to work out their dominance/submission issues. I never passed up the opportunity to let a CO (correctional Officer) know that while they could confine me they could never earn my respect. At some point this white hot antipathy had mellowed into something else; while not precisely a kumbuya thing more I'll-ignore-you-and-you-stay-out-of-my-face-type of relationship. Worked for me, as I fell off their radar I got more jobs and wasn't in as much trouble.
Apparently bureaucracies have long memories, or these people take things WAY too serious, since I can't seem to out-distance my admittedly long shadow. I don't have any problems reaping what I sow as long as it goes both ways. What I won't do is play the game that others do. I won't lick their boot simply to get a better job or other preferential treatment, I see others do that all the time, but I can't do it. Maybe I won't actively act like a criminal as I have in the past but I'm a convict and that's that. Among prisoners there is a hierarchy of the condemned. The lowest of the low is the offender. This is the snitch, the collaborator that for whatever reason get their self-esteem from working with the "police". As if the act of being a rat somehow elevates their ego and makes them more than they truly are. I don't know what a prison snitch gets out of this type of relationship since they are held in contempt by most CO's. In most prisons the life-expectancy of a prison snitch is very short. I don't think that on our state-issued ID cards it's a mistake that the largest word is OFFENDER, it's a word meant to show how unworthy we truly are.
END PART I
The first hint that all was not right came that Sunday at sweat lodge. I was talking to another Native that had worked in the same shop that I was trying to get into, and who still had connections there. The word was that when the boss had put my name up he was immediately told that not only was I not going to get the new job, but they (security) had no idea how I got the job I currently have. I, like most of the other people in here, just chuckled and said, "fuck 'em, if that's the way they want to be." What else could I do? I had just been told that my hard work getting my tutor certification and getting immediate employment (with recommendation from my instructor, no less) not to mention the hard work I had put in trying to teach grown men the finer points of comma use and parallel construction was nothing more than a bureaucratic snafu, an institutional hiccup. Ahhh, so bite me.
I guess that I was somewhat crushed though. Not only did I act like some fish ( a person new to the institution) and actually have HOPE, but worse, I thought that you could somehow escape or move beyond your past. I have always had nothing but contempt for people that work in "corrections"; sadists, hypocrits, and inbred mongoloids that were here to work out their dominance/submission issues. I never passed up the opportunity to let a CO (correctional Officer) know that while they could confine me they could never earn my respect. At some point this white hot antipathy had mellowed into something else; while not precisely a kumbuya thing more I'll-ignore-you-and-you-stay-out-of-my-face-type of relationship. Worked for me, as I fell off their radar I got more jobs and wasn't in as much trouble.
Apparently bureaucracies have long memories, or these people take things WAY too serious, since I can't seem to out-distance my admittedly long shadow. I don't have any problems reaping what I sow as long as it goes both ways. What I won't do is play the game that others do. I won't lick their boot simply to get a better job or other preferential treatment, I see others do that all the time, but I can't do it. Maybe I won't actively act like a criminal as I have in the past but I'm a convict and that's that. Among prisoners there is a hierarchy of the condemned. The lowest of the low is the offender. This is the snitch, the collaborator that for whatever reason get their self-esteem from working with the "police". As if the act of being a rat somehow elevates their ego and makes them more than they truly are. I don't know what a prison snitch gets out of this type of relationship since they are held in contempt by most CO's. In most prisons the life-expectancy of a prison snitch is very short. I don't think that on our state-issued ID cards it's a mistake that the largest word is OFFENDER, it's a word meant to show how unworthy we truly are.
END PART I
Sunday, June 27, 2010
Guest Blog from Jackie - Our Evaluation Project
This is a very difficult post to write. One, because it is such a large topic, and two, because Ani often has a completely different viewpoint of the subject from mine. In order to handle these two difficulties, I will a) start with the simplest and most immediate events and b) state my belief that differences of viewpoint are to be expected (and valued) anytime you have two people and I do not speak for Ani even if I might speak of my impression of his viewpoint.
Since 2002, when Ani obtained his adoption records and met his birth father and learned his birth name, birth place, tribe, and family history, Ani and I began to get a few answers to lots of things we had been searching for. Why did Ani not seem to learn from his experiences? Why did Ani keep "shooting himself in the foot" as he used to say? Why did Ani at times feel and act like he was 4 years old, or 8 years old? Why did the AODA programs he went to not seem to be enough help or to make any sense to him? Why was there such a gap between his intelligence and his ability to make good decisions or function in certain situations? Why did punishment have absolutely no effect on him? Why couldn't he anticipate the future or remember big chunks of his past? Why couldn't he keep a job or take care of himself?
What had driven such a wedge between him and his adoptive family that they asked the juvenile corrections people to instruct him not to come home or to contact them when he was released at age 18?
Were there answers that could help this make more sense? Or was it merely an attempt to divert attention from Ani's responsibility for his own choices and behaviors to even look for them? Was this a can of worms that was better left unexamined? From the Christian viewpoint of Ani's adoptive family and the Lutheran schools he attended as a child, Ani may have been seen as an ungrateful and willfully disobedient child who didn't try hard enough, with a deficient character in need of correction, discipline, and punishment. From the Correctional System viewpoint, Ani was a juvenile delinquent, who grew up to be a criminal. To the adoption/foster care system, Ani was a child who was unwanted by his parents and lucky to have a child welfare system to save him and an adoptive family willing to care for him. To the drug and alcohol program folks, Ani had to hit bottom, learn to tolerate pain ("no pain, no gain"), and become responsible for his own life. It is my impression that Ani absorbed bits and pieces of all of these viewpoints about himself, overlaying his own view that he had been stolen from his family and taken from everything and everyone that had meaning for him and that even his knowing of how that happened or how he even knew this was lost to him.
I do not have the answers and neither does Ani. Ani's response to difficult things is to put them under his mattress where they stay until they are safely forgotten or until he feels more able to deal with them. Today he told me that he had just found a whole lot of things under his mattress when he changed his sheets. Ani has limited ability to deal with difficult things and I suppose this strategy has enabled him to survive with his sanity intact, but it doesn't lend itself to a long term project with repeatingly difficult issues like getting the correctional system to allow him to have a thorough and competent neuropsychological evaluation.
There are many steps to this project. For 7 years both he and I asked the Dept of Corrections to allow him to receive treatment that had been recommended for him by an attachment therapist who saw him in 2002. A year ago we hired an attorney who agreed to help us to ask the Dept of Corrections to allow him to receive a more thorough evaluation to establish if there are neurological functional issues interferring with his ability to do things. It has taken one year for the attorney to learn enough for us to jointly develop a plan for moving forward.
In two days the attorney and I will be meeting with Dr. Wargowski who is a professor in the UW School of Medicine and also has a clinical practice. He is reputed to be an expert. The purpose of our meeting is simply to find out if he is the man we want to help us to design the evaluation, get the right professionals to be part of the team, and help us to summarize the findings, discuss the implications, and attempt to implement any treatment or accommodations that might be indicated.
Once we get the evaluation we want planned and outlined, and people on board willing to travel to the prison or see Ani in Madison at a locked facility (paying for Ani to be transported and for the guard who will watch him the whole time who knows how many times), the attorney will then write a detailed request to the prison describing what we want and why. Then we will wait to see if the prison will allow it. We may have to take legal action if they won't allow it, or perhaps they will and there won't be an issue.
Throughout all of this, it is of utmost importance that Ani be involved in decisions that need to be made and in defining and refining our purpose and goals. And, of course, once the evaluation is set up and approved, he will have to participate in it the best he can. These are things that are extremely difficult for him and he puts them under his mattress for them to go away....
So - wish us luck. We will keep you informed of our progress.
Jackie
Since 2002, when Ani obtained his adoption records and met his birth father and learned his birth name, birth place, tribe, and family history, Ani and I began to get a few answers to lots of things we had been searching for. Why did Ani not seem to learn from his experiences? Why did Ani keep "shooting himself in the foot" as he used to say? Why did Ani at times feel and act like he was 4 years old, or 8 years old? Why did the AODA programs he went to not seem to be enough help or to make any sense to him? Why was there such a gap between his intelligence and his ability to make good decisions or function in certain situations? Why did punishment have absolutely no effect on him? Why couldn't he anticipate the future or remember big chunks of his past? Why couldn't he keep a job or take care of himself?
What had driven such a wedge between him and his adoptive family that they asked the juvenile corrections people to instruct him not to come home or to contact them when he was released at age 18?
Were there answers that could help this make more sense? Or was it merely an attempt to divert attention from Ani's responsibility for his own choices and behaviors to even look for them? Was this a can of worms that was better left unexamined? From the Christian viewpoint of Ani's adoptive family and the Lutheran schools he attended as a child, Ani may have been seen as an ungrateful and willfully disobedient child who didn't try hard enough, with a deficient character in need of correction, discipline, and punishment. From the Correctional System viewpoint, Ani was a juvenile delinquent, who grew up to be a criminal. To the adoption/foster care system, Ani was a child who was unwanted by his parents and lucky to have a child welfare system to save him and an adoptive family willing to care for him. To the drug and alcohol program folks, Ani had to hit bottom, learn to tolerate pain ("no pain, no gain"), and become responsible for his own life. It is my impression that Ani absorbed bits and pieces of all of these viewpoints about himself, overlaying his own view that he had been stolen from his family and taken from everything and everyone that had meaning for him and that even his knowing of how that happened or how he even knew this was lost to him.
I do not have the answers and neither does Ani. Ani's response to difficult things is to put them under his mattress where they stay until they are safely forgotten or until he feels more able to deal with them. Today he told me that he had just found a whole lot of things under his mattress when he changed his sheets. Ani has limited ability to deal with difficult things and I suppose this strategy has enabled him to survive with his sanity intact, but it doesn't lend itself to a long term project with repeatingly difficult issues like getting the correctional system to allow him to have a thorough and competent neuropsychological evaluation.
There are many steps to this project. For 7 years both he and I asked the Dept of Corrections to allow him to receive treatment that had been recommended for him by an attachment therapist who saw him in 2002. A year ago we hired an attorney who agreed to help us to ask the Dept of Corrections to allow him to receive a more thorough evaluation to establish if there are neurological functional issues interferring with his ability to do things. It has taken one year for the attorney to learn enough for us to jointly develop a plan for moving forward.
In two days the attorney and I will be meeting with Dr. Wargowski who is a professor in the UW School of Medicine and also has a clinical practice. He is reputed to be an expert. The purpose of our meeting is simply to find out if he is the man we want to help us to design the evaluation, get the right professionals to be part of the team, and help us to summarize the findings, discuss the implications, and attempt to implement any treatment or accommodations that might be indicated.
Once we get the evaluation we want planned and outlined, and people on board willing to travel to the prison or see Ani in Madison at a locked facility (paying for Ani to be transported and for the guard who will watch him the whole time who knows how many times), the attorney will then write a detailed request to the prison describing what we want and why. Then we will wait to see if the prison will allow it. We may have to take legal action if they won't allow it, or perhaps they will and there won't be an issue.
Throughout all of this, it is of utmost importance that Ani be involved in decisions that need to be made and in defining and refining our purpose and goals. And, of course, once the evaluation is set up and approved, he will have to participate in it the best he can. These are things that are extremely difficult for him and he puts them under his mattress for them to go away....
So - wish us luck. We will keep you informed of our progress.
Jackie
I'm Just Saying...
I know that its been a while since my last post, and the delay isn't due to my hectic life. Then again, I suppose that prison life can indeed be hectic. Sadly, this is not the case. Prisons come in two flavors: hellholes and voids. A hellhole prison is one where stabbings, staff assaults, and other unsavory activities are a daily occurrence. These prisons do exist in the United States, but mostly are located in third world countries. The other type of prison, the void, is where the Division of Correction exerts such control over every aspect of day to day life that anything that could be dangerous is removed. By dangerous, that means anything that could cause spontaneous smiling or laughter has been removed from recreation, education, and the food. Guess what kind of prison I exist in?
I don’t like to complain about prison life for a variety of reasons. The first is the most obvious reason: If you don’t like how they run their prisons don’t be a criminal. I’m stupefied when I hear murderers, robbers, and other assorted tough guys whine about the quality and quantity of food, or not being allowed to watch “R” rated movies on the in-house CCTV. My personal belief is that the loss of freedom, something so important that it was mentioned second in the Declaration of Independence, is punishment enough. If I’ve harmed another human being so grievously that I must by segregated from others then how does the infliction of harm on me serve society’s goals?
Punishment is an anachronistic, foolish, and self-defeating policy that only appeals to society’s lowest common denominators. It’s hard to explain to people why dehumanizing prisoners is counter- productive (not to mention grossly hypocritical) to the goals of reformation. On the one hand as a Native American I do understand the inner drive to watch this world burn and to engage in the extinction of the white race. That’s a wee bit extreme but from time to time I get those urges. This desire to get even, for revenge not mere retribution, is human. I get it. I also understand that ultimately this is completely wasteful, a denial of everything this world could be.
I swing wildly between the two viewpoints: hugs and kisses for all or lay waste to all I see. I don’t know where the pendulum will come to rest, but if history is any guide then at some point in the future I’ll be free. What type of man do you want to look in the eyes when the bars are no longer between us and no one is there – the man filled with compassion an empathy for others whose first impulse is to laugh and smile or one that is filled with rage and resentment, devoid of self esteem, and with nothing to care about, or cared by, has nothing to lose?
I have no easy answers. Prison is hard and it should be. Prison should not make people worse and it does. It needs to evolve on a thousand levels from how its run to how it responds to the needs of the inmates, the community, and the needs of society. Bigger minds than mine are needed. Punishment is an anachronism. Reformation is a concept we all mouth toothlessly, unable to marshal the sophistication needed to be better human beings. I know I’ve misspent my meager reserves of potential but I still have a desire to not only be a better human being but to live in a better world.
I don’t like to complain about prison life for a variety of reasons. The first is the most obvious reason: If you don’t like how they run their prisons don’t be a criminal. I’m stupefied when I hear murderers, robbers, and other assorted tough guys whine about the quality and quantity of food, or not being allowed to watch “R” rated movies on the in-house CCTV. My personal belief is that the loss of freedom, something so important that it was mentioned second in the Declaration of Independence, is punishment enough. If I’ve harmed another human being so grievously that I must by segregated from others then how does the infliction of harm on me serve society’s goals?
Punishment is an anachronistic, foolish, and self-defeating policy that only appeals to society’s lowest common denominators. It’s hard to explain to people why dehumanizing prisoners is counter- productive (not to mention grossly hypocritical) to the goals of reformation. On the one hand as a Native American I do understand the inner drive to watch this world burn and to engage in the extinction of the white race. That’s a wee bit extreme but from time to time I get those urges. This desire to get even, for revenge not mere retribution, is human. I get it. I also understand that ultimately this is completely wasteful, a denial of everything this world could be.
I swing wildly between the two viewpoints: hugs and kisses for all or lay waste to all I see. I don’t know where the pendulum will come to rest, but if history is any guide then at some point in the future I’ll be free. What type of man do you want to look in the eyes when the bars are no longer between us and no one is there – the man filled with compassion an empathy for others whose first impulse is to laugh and smile or one that is filled with rage and resentment, devoid of self esteem, and with nothing to care about, or cared by, has nothing to lose?
I have no easy answers. Prison is hard and it should be. Prison should not make people worse and it does. It needs to evolve on a thousand levels from how its run to how it responds to the needs of the inmates, the community, and the needs of society. Bigger minds than mine are needed. Punishment is an anachronism. Reformation is a concept we all mouth toothlessly, unable to marshal the sophistication needed to be better human beings. I know I’ve misspent my meager reserves of potential but I still have a desire to not only be a better human being but to live in a better world.
Saturday, April 3, 2010
Guest Blog From Jackie - Day of Ani's Birth
Ani loves his Birthday. It is a great pleasure for me to share with him his delight and glee over the day of his birth. To be with Ani is to be given the gift of unabashed pleasure and fun as a child feels these things.
We can only wonder if Ani's mother and father felt some of this excitement and anticipation over his impending birth, but I have the feeling that they did. I came to know Ani's father from 2002-2006 and I spent quite a bit of time with him. He had a great respect for relationships but also some fear of them. As I came to learn more about Ani's father's family history, I understood more about the complexities of the Chosa family. I do not believe that Ben would have given a son his own name if he didn't intend to raise him. There is love and pride, promise and anticipation, in the act of giving his name to his son. And Ben was capable of huge amounts of these things. He was a man of very deep feeling.
From everything I have heard about Ani's mother, Betty, she was a very fun-loving and loving person. She also had a very complicated family history from what I know of it. It will be important to get more information about Ani's mother before relatives who store this information are no longer with us. Ani's mother Betty was her mother's oldest child. At some point, Betty lived with her grandmother and was adopted by her at age 14. At this time, Betty changed her last name to be the same as her grandmother's.
When Ben and Betty met in Chicago, they were not teenagers. Betty was 29 and Ben was 36. Betty had already had 7 (or 9?) other children before Ani. This was at least her 8th pregnancy. Modern science tells us that the mother's emotions create a chemical bath that passes through the placenta. In that way, the baby feels at a physiological level what his mother feels. If the mother is calm and peaceful, the baby's nervous system grows in an environment of different hormones and chemicals than if the mother is under stress. Ani's experience of family starts here, with a combination of genes, family history, culture, health, and intimate body states as he grew inside of his mother for 9 months, listening to his father's voice. Ani has a basic knowledge of what it means to be loved, and so I believe that joy was in Ani's mother's heart as she waited for her 8th child to be born. Perhaps there was also uncertainty at times.
Ani was born at 7:17 PM on Christmas Eve in 1966 at Cook County Hospital in Chicago, Illinois, named by his parents Ben Chosa, Jr. On his birth certificate it states that parents lived at 4131 N. Sheridan Road, that his father was a mover from "Laflambeau, Wis," age 41, and that his mother, Betty Marie Pierce Chosa, age 29, was born in Neopit, Wis.
This information is not available to many children and adults who were adopted. Ani was able to obtain it with the help of an attorney in 2002. This original birth certificate is an incredibly precious document. I would like to thank Attorney Michael Edmonds for helping us to obtain it and Jacy Boldebuck of the Adoption Search Program in Madison, Wisconsin, who sent Michael Edmonds the adoption file. We were told that the county who took custody of him in 1967 might have more records. So we then contacted Vilas County and after getting a court order - which was not a difficult process. After they got the court order, they looked in their basement and found his record on microfilm there. They printed it out and sent it to us and that file had the orginal birth certificate in it. We would like to thank Beth Moore at Vilas County for helping us to get the Vilas County records.
As I have learned first hand about Ani's experiences with family, I realize that I take family for granted. I take the fact that I know my mother and father for granted. Family members have repeated the story of my birth to me many times on my birthday. I take for granted the feelings that I store in my body that create my assumptions about permanency and security and who I am. It is difficult to realize that my beliefs and assumptions come from these experiences that shaped my world view from infancy through adulthood...and that my experience is just not true for Ani. I often state things about "the way life is" with such certainty that I must sound incredibly naive or superior-sounding to Ani. What must he think when he hears these unintended assumptions about parenting and family as if they are the only way life happens...and yet they exclude his experience entirely?
I was taught to "feel sorry for" children who didn't grow up like me. As a child, I sensed that there was something disrespectful, arrogant, ignorant, and downright dangerous about that teaching, yet I think that I was an unusual child. Aren't we wired to learn our culture's way of doing things so that we can succeed in it? And so wouldn't adoptive parents naturally try to teach their children how to succeed and give them the best they know? Yet, how this wiring must get confused and criss-crossed when a child is taken out of his own culture and raised by strangers who don't share his DNA, his instincts, his language, his history, or his culture! There was little or no education for adoptive parents in 1968 about raising children from another culture.
In 2002, Ani learned who his parents are and was told the story of his birth. During a visit in the prison visiting room, Ani's father told him the story of his 3 children. "I always said that you (Ben Jr.) were my Christmas present, Linda was my birthday present (born near his birthday), and Barbara was my turkey (born on Thanksgiving)." We all laughed at the family joke. I can still hear him saying that and it is a glorious memory.
In his last post about family, Ani said he can never make up for what he lost. The loss sits there, huge, and yet there are good things too. Families are never perfect. But Ani has one. In fact, for better or worse, he has four - his father's family in Lac du Flambeau, his mother's family in the Menomonee nation, his adoptive family, and now my family.
This is Ani's story.
Jackie
We can only wonder if Ani's mother and father felt some of this excitement and anticipation over his impending birth, but I have the feeling that they did. I came to know Ani's father from 2002-2006 and I spent quite a bit of time with him. He had a great respect for relationships but also some fear of them. As I came to learn more about Ani's father's family history, I understood more about the complexities of the Chosa family. I do not believe that Ben would have given a son his own name if he didn't intend to raise him. There is love and pride, promise and anticipation, in the act of giving his name to his son. And Ben was capable of huge amounts of these things. He was a man of very deep feeling.
From everything I have heard about Ani's mother, Betty, she was a very fun-loving and loving person. She also had a very complicated family history from what I know of it. It will be important to get more information about Ani's mother before relatives who store this information are no longer with us. Ani's mother Betty was her mother's oldest child. At some point, Betty lived with her grandmother and was adopted by her at age 14. At this time, Betty changed her last name to be the same as her grandmother's.
When Ben and Betty met in Chicago, they were not teenagers. Betty was 29 and Ben was 36. Betty had already had 7 (or 9?) other children before Ani. This was at least her 8th pregnancy. Modern science tells us that the mother's emotions create a chemical bath that passes through the placenta. In that way, the baby feels at a physiological level what his mother feels. If the mother is calm and peaceful, the baby's nervous system grows in an environment of different hormones and chemicals than if the mother is under stress. Ani's experience of family starts here, with a combination of genes, family history, culture, health, and intimate body states as he grew inside of his mother for 9 months, listening to his father's voice. Ani has a basic knowledge of what it means to be loved, and so I believe that joy was in Ani's mother's heart as she waited for her 8th child to be born. Perhaps there was also uncertainty at times.
Ani was born at 7:17 PM on Christmas Eve in 1966 at Cook County Hospital in Chicago, Illinois, named by his parents Ben Chosa, Jr. On his birth certificate it states that parents lived at 4131 N. Sheridan Road, that his father was a mover from "Laflambeau, Wis," age 41, and that his mother, Betty Marie Pierce Chosa, age 29, was born in Neopit, Wis.
This information is not available to many children and adults who were adopted. Ani was able to obtain it with the help of an attorney in 2002. This original birth certificate is an incredibly precious document. I would like to thank Attorney Michael Edmonds for helping us to obtain it and Jacy Boldebuck of the Adoption Search Program in Madison, Wisconsin, who sent Michael Edmonds the adoption file. We were told that the county who took custody of him in 1967 might have more records. So we then contacted Vilas County and after getting a court order - which was not a difficult process. After they got the court order, they looked in their basement and found his record on microfilm there. They printed it out and sent it to us and that file had the orginal birth certificate in it. We would like to thank Beth Moore at Vilas County for helping us to get the Vilas County records.
As I have learned first hand about Ani's experiences with family, I realize that I take family for granted. I take the fact that I know my mother and father for granted. Family members have repeated the story of my birth to me many times on my birthday. I take for granted the feelings that I store in my body that create my assumptions about permanency and security and who I am. It is difficult to realize that my beliefs and assumptions come from these experiences that shaped my world view from infancy through adulthood...and that my experience is just not true for Ani. I often state things about "the way life is" with such certainty that I must sound incredibly naive or superior-sounding to Ani. What must he think when he hears these unintended assumptions about parenting and family as if they are the only way life happens...and yet they exclude his experience entirely?
I was taught to "feel sorry for" children who didn't grow up like me. As a child, I sensed that there was something disrespectful, arrogant, ignorant, and downright dangerous about that teaching, yet I think that I was an unusual child. Aren't we wired to learn our culture's way of doing things so that we can succeed in it? And so wouldn't adoptive parents naturally try to teach their children how to succeed and give them the best they know? Yet, how this wiring must get confused and criss-crossed when a child is taken out of his own culture and raised by strangers who don't share his DNA, his instincts, his language, his history, or his culture! There was little or no education for adoptive parents in 1968 about raising children from another culture.
In 2002, Ani learned who his parents are and was told the story of his birth. During a visit in the prison visiting room, Ani's father told him the story of his 3 children. "I always said that you (Ben Jr.) were my Christmas present, Linda was my birthday present (born near his birthday), and Barbara was my turkey (born on Thanksgiving)." We all laughed at the family joke. I can still hear him saying that and it is a glorious memory.
In his last post about family, Ani said he can never make up for what he lost. The loss sits there, huge, and yet there are good things too. Families are never perfect. But Ani has one. In fact, for better or worse, he has four - his father's family in Lac du Flambeau, his mother's family in the Menomonee nation, his adoptive family, and now my family.
This is Ani's story.
Jackie
Sunday, March 14, 2010
The Clamicidal Maniac has been driving on me to get a response to her posts of 12-6 and 12-10-09, and I'm determined to get some sort of response out there. While I would like to thank her for her spectacular efforts, I talk to her so frequently that I don't know why I need to post my reactions to her posts. Whatever. I guess that I do understand the need for validation - it's just odd coming from such an accomplished, capable woman.
I'm not too sure I want to talk about her comments about knowing me.
I'm not too sure I want to talk about my family other than acknowledging that most of what has been said about them is true - as far as I know it to be. Klam Killer is right about one thing: I tend to live my relationships rather than analyze or understand them. My brain doesn't work like that - nope, I don't do abstractions.
That being said, here's what my relationship with my birth parents was like. I only knew my father when I met him at my sentencing in 2002; he died a few years after that. So how does that feel? Well, for you emotional vampires out there- I feel angry and cheated.
Maybe I understand that once he sobered up he really tried to do his best by me but so what? Understanding doesn't do shit for me; it seems to do more for other people. So he's gone and I'm not. Knowing him was nice maybe even great. I have a dad he existed; and he was a billion times better than the other one that thought he could buy himself an heir. Since I don't think I have much to say about "fathers" that wouldn't be negative let's move on to the next crappy exhibit. Mothers.
To me, my birth mother was a drunk who chose to go boozing with my "Aunt" rather than take care of her child. Maybe she was more than that in her later years but that means little to me. Maybe there is a reason, a damn good reason, for what she did but it doesn't change things for me. Do we see a pattern forming? For the dense, let me break it down for you - family is a weapon the universe uses against people least equipped to defend themselves from its deprivations. I have a family but for the life of me I don't know what good it is or what to do with them. So there isn't much to say about this subject.
I miss my dad. I miss what I was denied. I will never be complete and I will never stop being full of rage the way it all turned out. Best never to talk about this again. I think I'll just steep and stew in my bile for the next few decades. Good times.
I'm not too sure I want to talk about her comments about knowing me.
I'm not too sure I want to talk about my family other than acknowledging that most of what has been said about them is true - as far as I know it to be. Klam Killer is right about one thing: I tend to live my relationships rather than analyze or understand them. My brain doesn't work like that - nope, I don't do abstractions.
That being said, here's what my relationship with my birth parents was like. I only knew my father when I met him at my sentencing in 2002; he died a few years after that. So how does that feel? Well, for you emotional vampires out there- I feel angry and cheated.
Maybe I understand that once he sobered up he really tried to do his best by me but so what? Understanding doesn't do shit for me; it seems to do more for other people. So he's gone and I'm not. Knowing him was nice maybe even great. I have a dad he existed; and he was a billion times better than the other one that thought he could buy himself an heir. Since I don't think I have much to say about "fathers" that wouldn't be negative let's move on to the next crappy exhibit. Mothers.
To me, my birth mother was a drunk who chose to go boozing with my "Aunt" rather than take care of her child. Maybe she was more than that in her later years but that means little to me. Maybe there is a reason, a damn good reason, for what she did but it doesn't change things for me. Do we see a pattern forming? For the dense, let me break it down for you - family is a weapon the universe uses against people least equipped to defend themselves from its deprivations. I have a family but for the life of me I don't know what good it is or what to do with them. So there isn't much to say about this subject.
I miss my dad. I miss what I was denied. I will never be complete and I will never stop being full of rage the way it all turned out. Best never to talk about this again. I think I'll just steep and stew in my bile for the next few decades. Good times.
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
All Hail the Art Critics (you know who you are) :p
It has been brought to my attention that my artwork is inappropriate for some other people's delicate sensibilities. As such, I will be removing all of my art work and potentially reposting it some place else. When this reposting occurs, I will post a link to it. While it is not my practice to post by committee, I realize that my art might be a distraction to some and detract from other equally important issues. This way people who want to read can read and people who want to look at art can look at art.
Update 3/28/2010: To view my art work, go to my blog at: www.banishedart.blogspot.com
Update 3/28/2010: To view my art work, go to my blog at: www.banishedart.blogspot.com
Sunday, January 17, 2010
From the Slightly Skewed Mind of Ben Chosa Jr.
January 4, 2010
Here I sit facing a brand new year having survived a rather tumultuous 2009; although, I wouldn't be honest if I said that the last 365 days weren't both fun and maddening in equal measures. The best part of the year was beginning it with a job; I just didn't finish the year with the same job. This year also marked another trip to segregation. Another new lawyer, and another new angle to take to the courts. Thankfully nobody close to me died, but I'm worried and angry at the hot mess my sister has become. 2009 was the year that I made the best financial decisions of my life, and those who know me best will understand the earth-shattering importance of that. But before I get into that I want to get around to replying to some of the comments from those who have taken the time and effort to observe upon my rather drab and dreary world. Now, my world is that much less so (Is that even a sentence?).
On November 28 2009 anonymous said. . .
" Ani I have no training in art, but I do think that your drawing is very good. I found your blog, somewhat by accident and have read your post with some interest. It would be wrong for me to make judgements regarding your life, but from my perspective, I believe that reality and truth is often the midpoint between the perception of two people. It is good that you are trying to take responsibility for your actions. I hope that you will find peace in your life.”
...To which I say:
I am pleased that you found my blog. This would seem to be a case study in serendipity, and I am a great believer in "happy accidents." Since I have put my life on display I am inviting one and all to not only rubberneck at this car crash I call my Life, but to judge and make both jest and comment in equal portions. To paraphrase Napoleon, "Truth is just a fairy-tale agreed upon." I don't know about truth other than I can let everyone see my life not from my perspective alone, but from the mountain of documents that have been generated in the wake of my passing. It seems that everywhere I've been, loads of records and test results and comments from perfect strangers have been compiled and filed. Whether it was Lutheran Social Services, the Wisconsin Department of Corrections, or some drug treatment hospital, l did not pass through life very quietly. That's okay with me; after all, I have been known to have, at best, only a nodding acquaintance with the truth, so it is fortunate that one doesn't have to take just my word on things. While not always being prompt with taking responsibility I think I wouldn’t be abusing the truth to say that I usually own up to the messes that I make. I do enjoy being recognized for the effort. As for finding peace in my life I think that I’ll settle for having some fun, and laughing a lot. Currently that doesn't seem too far beyond me.
On that I will close and try to get this in the mail and posted.
Ani
Here I sit facing a brand new year having survived a rather tumultuous 2009; although, I wouldn't be honest if I said that the last 365 days weren't both fun and maddening in equal measures. The best part of the year was beginning it with a job; I just didn't finish the year with the same job. This year also marked another trip to segregation. Another new lawyer, and another new angle to take to the courts. Thankfully nobody close to me died, but I'm worried and angry at the hot mess my sister has become. 2009 was the year that I made the best financial decisions of my life, and those who know me best will understand the earth-shattering importance of that. But before I get into that I want to get around to replying to some of the comments from those who have taken the time and effort to observe upon my rather drab and dreary world. Now, my world is that much less so (Is that even a sentence?).
On November 28 2009 anonymous said. . .
" Ani I have no training in art, but I do think that your drawing is very good. I found your blog, somewhat by accident and have read your post with some interest. It would be wrong for me to make judgements regarding your life, but from my perspective, I believe that reality and truth is often the midpoint between the perception of two people. It is good that you are trying to take responsibility for your actions. I hope that you will find peace in your life.”
...To which I say:
I am pleased that you found my blog. This would seem to be a case study in serendipity, and I am a great believer in "happy accidents." Since I have put my life on display I am inviting one and all to not only rubberneck at this car crash I call my Life, but to judge and make both jest and comment in equal portions. To paraphrase Napoleon, "Truth is just a fairy-tale agreed upon." I don't know about truth other than I can let everyone see my life not from my perspective alone, but from the mountain of documents that have been generated in the wake of my passing. It seems that everywhere I've been, loads of records and test results and comments from perfect strangers have been compiled and filed. Whether it was Lutheran Social Services, the Wisconsin Department of Corrections, or some drug treatment hospital, l did not pass through life very quietly. That's okay with me; after all, I have been known to have, at best, only a nodding acquaintance with the truth, so it is fortunate that one doesn't have to take just my word on things. While not always being prompt with taking responsibility I think I wouldn’t be abusing the truth to say that I usually own up to the messes that I make. I do enjoy being recognized for the effort. As for finding peace in my life I think that I’ll settle for having some fun, and laughing a lot. Currently that doesn't seem too far beyond me.
On that I will close and try to get this in the mail and posted.
Ani
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