Hancuffed to Freedom

We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit. ~Aristotle. I love this quote. It reminds me how important my habits are.   I have made a commitment to update this blog once a week. I’m going to make it a habit, because I learned this secret about myself: when I actively work to change one habit, every aspect of my life improves. Everybody knows that prison doesn't prepare people to succeed when they return to society. In order to succeed a person has to figure it out themselves. For me, the changes in my behavior came from reading self help books, often ones that were considered contraband by the prison. Let me share with you an example of how I prepared myself for success despite the keen eye of the prison overlords. I knew from all the bad habits I had developed in my life, that my habits are my destiny. I knew my destiny didn't look too bright. I had to a lot of bad habits to change. One habit I knew I needed to work on was my financ...

July 17, 2019 I know. I know. I've been slacking when it comes keeping this thing updated. Life comes at you fast. After all the years I spent dreaming of all the the things I wanted to to do, I feel like I'm trying to do everything at once. Between working and exploring and building a videography business, trying to make a documentary is damn near impossible. To be honest, I didn't know how to tackle an endeavor that colossal. But that's about to change. I have been infused with a new sen se of purpose. With the help of an old film school buddy, I reframed how I want to tell the story. I want to follow a handful of people from different backgrounds, with different circumstances, and tell their story from the moment they get out through the first critical weeks. The problem: I would need to dedicate lots of time and money to accomplish that.  The solution: I may have found that money. I was fortunate enough to go to Netroots Nation in Philly- this huge convention...

May 17, 2019 I still have moments when I ask myself, is this real? I was driving down the I-10 this morning feeling bad about a certain difficulty I’m going through in my life right now and it hit me. It was like I was knocked out of my body, looking down on everything. I realized that I was in a car (my car) driving down the freeway to a job (my job) where I work on media projects (my passion) for an organization that works to reduce the size and scope of the criminal punishment system ( my fight).  I remember vividly a moment during my incarceration when I had 4 years of prison behind me and 4 ½ more to go. I was halfway through a journey in the depths of hell. I was in the grip of a heroin addiction, and as I sat in my cell with the lights off, I felt so alone, forgotten. I hated my self. I hated the world. I had no hope for the future. When I thought about what would happen when I was released, there was a blank spot. Critical error. File not found.  At that time I nev...

March 29, 2019 Today I’m going to talk to 900 5th graders about drug and alcohol awareness.

"I didn’t feel like a conqueror. I barely felt like a human being. But Shane stood there, all rugged bravado, master of his world. It made me want to stand up, hammer my fists against my chest, and welcome all challengers." https://www.southwestfolklife.org/the-convict-code/?fbclid=IwAR34lhnDCqjjXN7yXG7N0ANqLldMF8UQ2HTzPBiM31f9Odk8-jWIiOSHjuM

January 15, 2019 On the 22nd a group of us formerly incarcerated will be  headed to the state capitol for ASFC’s  # Reframingjusticeday . We actually have a shot at making some real change in the justice system. I’ve been chosen to tell my story at the press conference and I’ll be introduced by Piper Kerman, who wrote Orange Is The New Black. On top of that, I have an interview with a writer from the Arizona Daily Star on Thursday, about the Reframing Justice Day.  I’m kind of freaking out becau se less than two months ago I was sitting in a cell, hoping I would have enough money to buy a cell phone when I got out. Now I’m practicing a speech that I have to deliver to a group legislators and a phalanx of reporters with news cameras. It’s quite the change, I’ll tell you that. My story, the one I’ll be telling at the press conference, is not one I’m proud of, but its real. The only thing that’s keeping me from shitting in my pants is that we have a real shot at helping a ...

January 5, 2018 I pulled up to Del Taco today and I saw 2 Guys in Prison blues standing out front. Looking closer, I realized one of them was my old workout partner. I knew he was getting out soon, but what are the odds that I would run into him in the middle of the city on the day he was released? Recently my life has been one serendipitous moment after another. My old workout partner still had that feral, just-out-of-the-cage look in his eyes. It tripped me out because I remember how it fe lt that first day, how intense everything was, and even though it has only been a month, it feels like a lifetime ago. Unfortunately, he doesn’t have family out here and he has to stay at a halfway house. He knows about the documentary and I told him that I'd like to interview him about what he's experiencing. Now that things have settled down a little bit I'm going to begin filming later this month. A friend was generous enough to donate lighting equipment for interviews, and now wit...

December 21, 2018 Christmas shopping is hard. I have not had to choose anything in a very long time. Being locked up, I didn’t need to decide much – What should I wear today? Oh, how about the same orange outfit I wear every day? What should I eat for breakfast? Whatever the hell the menu says. What should I do today? The same thing I do everyday, Pinky. Now that I’m a free man I have to make all kinds of decisions, like what do I get my Mom for Christmas? I went to Wal-Mart yesterday and my  head almost exploded. There is so much stuff in Wal-Mart. Vibrating massage chairs, Bluetooth home audio systems, giant fuzzy pandas. And it was all coming at me at warp speed. I felt like sitting down in the middle of the aisle and throwing a fit. I think that 4 year old in the wrapping-paper section was on to something. How does anyone function in the world with all of the choices available? Despite all the fresh, newness of the world around me, I still feel prison following me, stal...

Dec. 3, 2018 I feel like a dog that got let off his leash, all excited, sniffing butts and peeing on stuff. This still doesn’t feel real. The night before I got out everyone told me, “Dude, you’re going to trip out the first time you go to a store.” I’m thinking, Yeah right, they’re just blowing it up, and making it more dramatic than it is.  Then, I walked in to the store. It was an out of body experience. The lights, the colors, the choices, the cashier ringing someone u p—it was so absolutely ordinary, yet completely alien. I hadn’t gotten any sleep the night before so I was running off pure adrenaline. Then I got an energy drink, and the world melted into a surreal puddle of swirling colors. Thanks to some wonderful people (Juliana and Nathan) we were able to film those first moments. We got some good stuff: at one point, as we were walking into Nico’s, a guy pulled up and rolled down his window. He says, “Congratulations, Homie.” I look at him sideways. He’s looking at the bl...

November 4, 2018 I’ve been reading this book called “The Power of Habit.” It’s mind-numbing how much of our behavior is governed by habit. Habits go deep. There was this guy, Eugene, who had part of his brain destroyed by a virus. He wasn’t able to make new memories. After he had moved into a new house, a doctor visited him and ran some tests. The doctor asked Eugene, “When you get out of bed in the morning, how do you leave the room?” Eugene couldn’t answer. He didn’t know.  Then as the doctor wrote his notes, Eugene got up and left the room. He went down the hall to the bathroom. The toilet flushed, the faucet ran, and he came back and sat down. It proves that the routines that guide our memory go deeper than memory, or even conscious thought. So much of our lives are scripts that we act out without even thinking about it. But one thing that we’ve got going for us is that we can consciously write those scripts. It got me thinking about how important it will be to develop good ...

October 23, 2018 This is the story of how cat shit turned my day around. This morning, as I walked to breakfast, I was lost in my thoughts, dreading all the stuff I had to do today. I have to workout and go to work and I don’t want to because I’m tired. And at work, I’m going to end up cleaning the line because everyone else is too lazy . . . As I continued to feel sorry for myself, I was almost too distracted to see the cat shit in the middle of the sidewalk. I barely missed  stepping in it. My thought process went like this: Whoa, I almost stepped in that. Is that cat shit? What’s cat shit doing in the middle of the sidewalk? And what’s a cat doing at a prison in the middle of the desert? I turned and continued on my way to breakfast. Good thing I didn’t step in that. That would have sucked. Someone’s probably going to step in it. Better them than me. I stopped. Maybe I should pick it up. No, why would I? It’s not like anyone would go out of their way to pick up some shit. I s...

October 21, 2018 I’m 31 today. I’ve spent 8 birthdays in prison. Almost one-third of my life. Weird. You don’t celebrate birthdays in here, because when someone finds out it’s your birthday the only party you’re getting is a blanket party — they tie you to your bunk with a blanket and beat the shit out of you. Only recently have I needed to remember how old I am. One time, in the middle years of my prison sentence, someone asked me how old I was. I honestly couldn’t remember.  I had to do the math. What’s strange is that when I was doing time, time ceased to exist, but now that my time is served, it ticks incessantly.

November 22, 2018 I’m thankful that this is my last holiday in this place.

October 18, 2018 They pushed my release date back to November 29th. Central office audited my file and found that they had miscalculated my end date. Apparently this is quite common. It reminds me of that commercial where that old guy in waders has a fishing line with a dollar on it. “Hey there, I gotcha a dollar —Ohp! Too slow.” I flipped out on the COIII. It was pretty out of character for me. I mean, he was totally being a pompous dick about it, but I shouldn’t have lost m y cool like that. It was like all this stress, which I didn’t even know I had bottled up, came to the surface. It was embarrassing especially after I have spent so much time working on self-improvement. I should’ve had more control of myself. I apologized to him afterward, but I could have gotten a write up. That would have pushed my release date even further. I can’t do that sort of thing out there. It just reminds me that self-improvement is a never ending process. And I know better than to put so much ex...

October 5, 2018 I hear about my friends and their lives now. They have kids and houses, and good jobs with 401Ks. I feel so far behind. I’ll be 31 and starting over from the bottom with nothing. In some ways I think it’s a blessing. When you’re starting from the bottom with nothing, life is so full of potential. I have this hunger — for life, for love, for challenge, for redemption, for experience — that burns inside me, not like a fire that flares up and dies, but like coals  that have been stoked for years so they burn hot and steady. I remember when I was “free” before all this, I was in a prison of my own making, ruled by fears, driven by expectations, controlled by addictions, and it took me losing my freedom to know what freedom is. It took me knowing death to understand what life really is. I’ve been thinking about going on a journey when I get off parole. I have this fantasy of drifting around the country for awhile, taking jobs here and there; maybe go work on the oil...

October 31, 2018 Since I wear orange everyday, this Halloween I’m going to be a pumpkin (same as last year).

September 5, 2018 My neighbor explained to me some of the reasons it’s so hard to transition to the real world. He says it’s because you’re going from a controlled environment where you’re told when to wake up, when to go to bed, when to eat, what to eat, where to live, how to live, what to wear, and how to wear it. You have absolutely no responsibilities other than mental and physical survival, and to do that you must develop a new way of being. You become hyper-aware of you r surroundings and potential threats, because there are people poised to take advantage of any sign of weakness. Your ability to project the potential for violence becomes the measure of your value as a man. Social exchanges are calculated. Emotion is weakness, trust a liability. Then they release you into the world with $100 and you’re told to be a responsible, effective member of society. You need to have a job, a place to live, manage your money, pay your bills, your fines, and you’re supposed to just snap o...

September 1, 2018 I’ve been doing an unofficial poll around here, asking people if this is their first time in prison. For roughly 4 out of 5 guys I ask, this is not their first time down. Of course, I then ask, “Why did you come back?” Almost unanimously the story’s the same. It begins with them doing really well al first, and then drinking gets involved. There usually is an unhealthy relationship that develops. The drinking leads to drugs, and that kick starts a vicious whi rlwind tour of crime, sex, and self destruction: The story is so common it has become cliché. I can’t ever drink again. I know that. Drinking opens the door for drugs. It’s just that for most of my teens and all of my adult life when I was out there, I used substances to have fun and escape. Now I’ll be building a life free of that. I don’t even know what a normal life looks like. I’m excited to find out. Now that I’ve been in recovery programs for quite some time now, I know how important it is to set the to...