I said I would post my essays next but we haven’t caught up in so long I decided to do this first. How the heck have you been?
May 2020: Shooowee, I had front row seats to a gang fight (essentially different ethnic groups). I was eating lunch when I heard scuffling at the table in front of me; I looked up, saw trays flying and two guys swinging wildly. Five seconds later twenty more were going at it. So many it was hard to know where to look.
Fights in the chow hall are somewhat common (anywhere from daily to a handful a month) so at first I just kept eating, but soon I realized I’d better move. Mouth full, fork still in there, I grabbed my tray and backed up a few tables. By then the guards were shouting what they always do: “Stop fighting!” And when that of course didn’t work the pepper spray started flowing. At the same time, more and more guards streamed in with more and more spray.
Then they screamed at everyone: “EVERYONE! Get down on the floor! Face down! Get down on the floor! NOW!” By this time the spray was filling the room and everyone started coughing. I remember looking up at some point and seeing one of the guard’s eyes: huge and darting like it was wartime. They cuffed up all the perpetrators and then slowly marched them out, one at a time, faces scrunched up and dripping with spray, some with blood. We were all couching on the ground, straining our necks looking up to see who was involved.
But it wasn’t over yet. The recreation yard is adjacent to the chow hall and as they escorted individuals out, gang members in the yard saw what’d happened and they went at it too. All said and done, around seventy people were sent to the hole that day (disciplinary segregation housing). But for fear of further retaliation we were all (2000+ inmates) placed on lock-down for three days. This meant we were stuck in our cells 24hrs a day and fed sack lunches.
During that time staff met with gang leaders and negotiated a settlement. Why did they fight? Without being the ones involved, who can say for sure, but rumors said people were disrespecting others, for all sorts of reasons, from both sides.
Sounds familiar right - people offending people. Why are we so sensitive? Why are we so inconsiderate? How do we change this?
As it turned out, the lockdown was a sign of things to come. One week later our COVID numbers spiked and we went into a quarantine lockdown. We were already running at a limited schedule due to Corona but now we were confined to our cells again, 24/7 for almost two weeks. And then we slowly got released for short bits at a time: first to shower and then eventually to yard and phones. I suppose it was similar to what everyone went through during lockdowns, but perhaps on steroids.
Since then, over the months, we have slowly loosened up lingering restrictions but still have no visits, which has sucked, because one of the advantages of being in here is that I get to know my family again. At least we have phone calls, which do make a huge difference in my life.
June 2020: I’d been thinking about starting a blog as a way to send out these updates and as a way for people to get to know me. But how? Although we get access to tablets for email communication we have zero internet access. I know. Yikes. But guess who came to the rescue? My mom! She might be BBC (Born Before Computers) but she’s a Webmaster now! She took the massive learning curve and put this whole site together from A to Z! So impressed. #skills#stillgotit #bestmomever.
During June we started talking about what to do and over the next few months we were mailing back and forth deciding on templates and stuff. She was also sending me photos of our family from the 70s and 80s (incase you don’t know I have an older sister, older brother, and younger brother). Oh. My. Word. What a blast from the past. I haven’t seen these pics in like thirty years! It opened up memories I’d forgotten I had and was really good for me - they made me feel warm and connected again.
But I did shed some tears. I ran because of exaggerated charges, and it wasn’t easy - I paid a huge price living in the shackles of isolation for twenty-five years. So, it felt like I’d been through the ringer already, before I turned myself in, but at least I’m not alone anymore. I’m looking forward to making lots of new pics with family and friends. Smile!
July 2020: The facility I’m in is known for being cold in the winter and hot in the summer, and they weren’t kidding. July brought some nice hot days that made for some pretty stuffy living conditions. But then, for the first time ever, they started selling little 5” fans! It’s nothing powerful but boy-oh-boy it makes a nice difference pointed straight at your face! They can be plugged in or run off batteries, which is great for positioning when exercising. LOVE my little fan. Respect to people over the last 154 years who lived here without fans.
August 2020: We lifted a level of lock-down and they started letting contractors back in the building. This meant the G.E.D. Education program restarted and I went back to work as the clerk. It was nice to go back as I’d been off for four-and-a-half months and it reopened an area for me to spend time in - your cell, chow hall, and yard can get kinda repetitive. They also started allowing haircuts again (done by inmates - some more experienced than others lol) and I got a nice short one for summer.
I also spent the month trying out a technique called Trauma Releasing Exercises (T.R.E.). A good friend of mine benefited from it after experiencing a physical accident in her twenties, but it can help with anything a person feels was traumatic. It was actually developed by a trauma expert working in war-torn Africa. The exercises are light but make your body shake and release stored up stress. He says it’s a natural process but one we normally block. I felt lighter after doing them.
At the end of August the first friend I’d made here went home (he was here for six years). He’s gone out of his way to help orientate me and get me settled in here, which was really nice and a real blessing. You can request a move up to four times a year so when he left I decided to move into his cell. It has a fresh paint job and he’d organized some wooden hooks on the walls, which go a long way in cramped living. He’d even rigged a string-pull light switch made from little wooden blocks and string running to the real light switch. This meant I could turn on the light from bed in the mornings, which I loved because I’m not an easy waker. It’s the little things. Out of necessity I’ve since moved from there, but I’ll tell you about that later.
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Well that’s it for now but I’ll update the next few months soon. I just wanted to touch base before the end of the year and say, “Who saw that coming, right?” It’s been a topsy-turvy year for sure, and I know it’s challenged us all. After doing it for a while now, and despite its beauty and joy, my take is that life isn’t easy, it just isn’t. It’s hard, unexpected, and relentless. BUT, it truly does seem that what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. So, here we are today, maybe not all the way, but all of us in some way: stronger, wiser, better, and more capable than before. Heck yea.
Happy holidays!
Thanks for spending time with me and let me know how you’re doing?
Love,
Barrett Preston Busschau.
I hope you are well and would love to hear from you!
Check out my next blog: A general update from September 2020 - December 2020
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