A good friend of mine is locked up in a Texas prison. For years, he taught other inmates, a position he left voluntarily in part because of the power plays and politics revolving around such a seemingly cushy position. Instead, he volunteered himself to work in wastewater—literally scraping shit off a metal grate to keep the archaic sewer system flowing, not to mention the dozens of other tasks required.
He liked this job, even though its hours were brutal: 7 days a week, 365 days a year, for 12-18 hours per day. On the plus side, he was left mostly on his own, out of the Building, with a crumbling, antebellum shack he turned into a haven: he planted a garden; he adopted cats and protected them from the wrath of guards, inmates, and crocodiles alike. He spent the hours reading, teaching himself German, and listening to football on his radio through the speaker he built from headphones and the end of a soda can.
He learned the system he was responsible for maintaining better than the “professionals” the state sent to make needed repairs. He often found himself having to correct them, to inform them they had not fixed what was broken; or the process they were about to undertake would cause the system to flood instead of function. He was routinely ignored, of course—who the fuck are you to tell me what to do?
I hadn’t heard from my friend in almost two weeks. When someone you care about is incarcerated, you learn to get used to suspenseful silences of varying lengths. Most likely, they’re on lockdown. Maybe he caught chain, sent across the state with no notice and no explanation.
So when my phone rang late the other night, I was excited to see the name of the company through which all inmate calls are routed. As soon as I picked it up, my phone died. God dammit! I raced for my backup handset, and it was dead, too. By the time my phone rang again the next morning, I was ready.
“Are you OK?” I asked immediately. “Were you on lockdown?”
“No,” he began. “It was so much worse.”
He had been at work, 24 hours a day, alone, for 4 and a half days. He had received 2 sack lunches, consisting solely of cold pancake sandwiches, on the days he was lucky. Every time he went to the front to let the supervisor know he was still there, and still hadn’t been fed, and still needed help, he was told to leave. He was told she was the boss, and who did he think he was to tell her what was needed. He was told if he came back one more time, she would initiate a case against him (which would go on his record and could harm his chances at parole).
The breaking point, he said, was when he finally received yet another sack lunch, covered in dirt, the inside of which was swarmed with ants.
“What the fuck is this?” he asked the man who was tasked with delivering this relief.
“You wanted to eat, right?”
“I’m not eating that shit!” my friend replied, and thrust the bag away.
He went back out front.
He told the lady to write him up if she wanted, but he was quitting his job, and the warden could come talk to him if he wanted, but he was done.
After some back and forth, a Sergeant came out. The Sergeant told my friend that he doesn’t tell them when he quits his job, or when he eats, or when he gets to go back to his unit. My friend informed the Sergeant that was exactly what he was doing.
“Do you know who the fuck I am? the Sergeant replied.
“I don’t give a fuck who you are,” my friend shot back.
“Put your hands behind your back,” he was ordered.
And he did.
Luckily, all of this occurred in a very public place, and another staff member familiar with the situation intervened. I both admire and fear the force of my friend’s personality. He takes shit from no one, will not be spoken to or treated as less than he is. It is both a survival strategy in an eminently hostile environment and a predictor of conflict he does not need. He has gotten much better at what he does and does not respond to, but still…sometimes it scares me.
“I was exhausted,” he explained. “I was out there working that whole time, with barely any food, shit I wouldn’t eat if it wasn’t the only thing I had, that barely gets you by sitting on your ass in the Building. I’ve been doing all the shit I’m supposed to do, on my fucking own, for both shifts, with no break, for days. I’m not going back.”
Nor should he.
He tried to recommend other dudes for the open positions—one person to work days (my friend), one person to work nights (left on parole), and someone for him to train to step in either shift for extra help or when the next guy leaves (strung out and useless). He tried to recommend people he knew had a good work ethic, or who could be taught and he thought needed a brother figure, or at least weren’t constantly high or willing to risk everyone’s futures for their own impulsive needs.
But the person in authority saw this as my friend just trying to control shit, to undermine her authority, or to concoct some dastardly scheme whilst raking feces and fixing hoses. I know it is prison, and I know suspicion is warranted, but all of these responses are about petty ego bullshit and the exertion of authority for its own sake.
I fear for the ramifications, or just straight retaliation, my friend might face as a result of committing the ultimate crime against abusive authority—being in the right, and knowing it, and saying so, then PROVING it, and where everyone can witness. He proves the lie to their claims, demonstrates the absurdity of their leverage, and publicly humiliates them.
Abusive authority responds to such situations as to a hostile attack, encircles the source of disturbance, then turns that authority into a weapon. I’ve been struggling with this myself as of late, though in entirely different forms and circumstances. But it is a parallel emotional journey, something my friend and I share in numerous ways.
He mentioned this to me, once he finished telling me what had happened. I’d recently sent him a letter, a long deep-dive into my personal crises that I don’t want to over-burden him with on the phone, something I almost did not send, feeling suddenly selfish and thoughtless for dumping so much of my shit on him. He urged me to send it, so I did, and he finally received it when he got back to his bunk after the week of hell he’d endured, and he read it through and thought about it and called me in the morning and discussed it with me.
Because he is a good friend. Because he is a good man.
He has not let the repeated abuses, the daily degradation, and the threat of violence alter his fundamental character. He could have done prison the “easy” way—he could have turned his physical, intellectual, and charismatic forces to manipulate, intimidate, and bully his way to get what he wants, as many of his peers do. But that is not who he is.
I admire him for this, and I aspire to take the lessons from his struggles to heart. If he can endure, and improve as a person, and carry his head high in a system as septic as the job he so recently relinquished, then, dammit, so can I.
