Please, someone get the reference. If not, you guys have no sense of classic cinema. Brett?
It's that time again! I saw that a whole one person has written since my last blog so everyone is probably wondering what is wrong with me for not posting. But as many you probably know, I am a lazy person and I normally tend to not do anything unless I absolutely need to. For example, I own a diary but I have not written in it for over a year and a half. However, a story has developed that has grown oh so awesome that I can no longer keep it to myself. That story is my prison rotation. Warning: While I try to keep to my comedic self as always, the nature of the subject will make certain parts of this post dark. It is also very long. Long and dark:
I am going to start this blog off a little boring, but I promise that it will get better. I will talk about rapists, pedophiles, death row, and Texas style bbq later, but first have to give you a lesson on why I should do a prison rotation in the first place. UTMB is in a contract with the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) for providing health care to over half of the state of Texas. This includes Hospital Galveston (HG), which is a 100 bed facility Correctional Managed Care (CMC) facility on our main campus. I add all of these acronyms because people use them interchangeably, which is really confusing and annoying. They also sometimes even use TDC, which I guess is the cool way to say TDCJ because its shorter. The UTMB version of lol...lol. Our CMC pharmacy in Huntsville is also one of the largest pharmacies in the nation. It averages around 18k script fills a day. In comparison, our main hospital, which is 426 bed, does around 5k script fills.
When we all think of prison, we usually think of something like Oz. Murderous people who are caged up and if it wasn't for the fence or the guards, these people would be raping or shiving you. That perception is not quite true. Prisoners (the pc term is offenders)are people too, so don't hate. I have heard multiple times is that the only difference between the inmates and the guards is that the inmates got caught. When on the units, we are allowed to walk freely amongst them. They get close enough to be able to do real damage if they want to, but on any given day when you walk down the street, a motorist could kill you if they want also. Ah the daily risks we take without even thinking of it. Of course, before walking into a prison unit they warn you that if an event occurs and you are taken prisoner by the prisoners, you are on your own and the guards wont help you.
The first time on the unit is scary. It is kind of a right of passage. You try to keep a poker face and really puff your chest out to show you are ready for business, but in reality you look like an idiot. Imagine if you were walking down the street and while everyone else is walking normally, one person is trying to look as big as possible while simultaneously weaving to be as far as everyone else as they can and not looking anyone in the eye. Sounds kinda weird right?
The main event of my prison rotation was my visit to Huntsville prison with Emily, Owen, and Tony. Owen, or Dr. Murray, is our VP of CMC. Tony, or Dr. Williams, or Big Cat, is in charge of CMC inpatient care. Emily is my boss. Tony and Owen have an interesting relationship that often includes inappropriate albeit hilarious jokes. Owen refers Tony as Big Baby sometimes because Tony occasionally will complain about his leg hurting. His leg hurts because years ago, a car swiped him on the side of the interstate while he was changing a tire. He almost died. He has a pronounced limp and some intense scars that he once told his daughter's third grade class were from a prison riot. The first thing that Tony said to me was that it was racist of me for making him sit in the back of the car. 1. I didn't make him sit in the back of the car, he chose to 2. I didn't even realize he was black until then. I just though he had a good tan.
Our first stop was the Walls Unit. The Walls Unit contains the oldest prison cell west of the Mississippi. It is also where Dog, the Bounty Hunter, was kept when he was in prison. It is also is home of the most active execution chamber in the United States. Between 1982 and 2008, 423 people were executed there (in hindsight, this fact probably should have preceded the Dog comment in importance, but common! it's Dog).
This next fact may alarm a couple of you folks...
I voluntarily got strapped into the death chamber. I have told people this and I always expect people to ask what it was like but the the most common response is "why?" Not why as in "why, that is so interesting," but rather a "what the hell is wrong with you" why. For all of you judgemental people, the same ones who looked down offenders as lesser beings, I like to live life by the seat of the pants and have a hard time saying no to such an opportunity for an unique perspective on life.
For those venturous souls, it was an interesting experience. The part that has stuck in my brain is the lighting. Laying back, you stare directly into a neon light. If any of you ever read about interior decorating, as is actually important for designing a hospital, you will no doubt learn that not all neon lights are the same. Many include different spectrums that provide warm or soothing moods, and while more expensive, these are the lights that you should include in hospital design. Death row isn't about being lavish. They bought the cheapest lights. They are cold, dim, flickering ones that are in the death chamber. They give you an inherent feel of depression and emptiness. That is the feeling I had when I was on the death chamber and that is probably the feeling that many of those individuals had in their last moments.
Sidenote: I don't really have a strong view for or against capital punishment, but it really gave me insight on the intensity and emotion involved in the subject, which often takes back seat to logic.
Okay... take a few breaths for a moment. Let's change the subject on something lighter...
By far, my favorite part in the Walls Unit is the Piddlin Shop. The Piddlin Shop is basically the souvenir shop. It's is where offenders on good behavior can spend time creating goods that are then sold in the free world. I have to admit that at points, I am kind of jealous of the inmates. Some places have cable tv (I don't), you automatically have a bunch of people around who you can talk to night and day (I live alone and think it's kinda boring), you have table tennis (I love table tennis), and you even get arts and crafts time :( . Of course there are three strong reasons I never want to be sentenced. One is so obvious that I wont even mention it, but I will discuss the other two later.
For the lieutenant who played our tour guide for the day, the Piddlin Shop is also the scariest part. This is primarily because of how it is organized. Each offender has their own work bench, which is similar to a high school lab bench. The shop itself is just two rows wide by about 30 benches long with about five feet of walking space in between the rows. We walked freely throughout the shop while the Lieutenant attempted to watch over all of us. In reality, he probably could only see two of us at one given time, let alone be close enough to stop someone from harming us. And they even had weapons that they could use to harm us here. At one point, I was face to face with an offender who had a power drill in his hand. Talk about adrenaline rush.
As I mentioned earlier, you are able to buy merchandise from the offenders. It is really high quality and personalized stuff and it ranges from chairs and paintings to jewelry and boots. There is supposedly a black market for paintings from people on deathrow. While I would consider such a painting, I decided to start small.
Last week I made a second trip to Huntsville to commission the manufacture of two belts and one wallet. I had to go after work so it was a really shady business in coming to a prison after hours. I felt like if I was in a movie, I would be breaking someone out. Coincedentally, Huntsville is the prison that Bonnie broke Clyde out of. Supposedly you can still see strafe marks on the wall from her Tommy gun.
While the wallet and one of the belts I bought as Christmas presents for family, the other belt was for me. The belt for me is going to define me. What demonstrates my Texas and Yaaaaaale background more than a trophy belt buckel that has the Y logo on it. Woot! However, prison is not all fun and games. The guy commissioned to do my metal work (buckle) is in prison for 300 years. He is a convicted serial rapist. While the moral side of me thought this isn't right to financially support a rapist in any way just because it's waaaay cheaper, the truth is that it is for a good cause. The prison makes a large profit from its piddlin business and our prison system is grossly underfunded. Besides, I like to think that I am helping him turn his life around because for once in his life, his efforts in making belt buckles help keep pants on (yeah, I went there).
This is a good seg into the creepiest experience from prison. That would be the geriatric section in the Estelle Unit because of all of the pedophiles. Geriatric inmates are kept separately from young inmates because they get bullied by the younger, more spry inmates, who like to beat on them and steal their food. About 80% of all geriatric inmates are sex offenders, and not all of them go for girls. Emily, who is my boss, is decently pretty, especially if you don't see females every day. However, she was not getting the looks when we visited. I was!
The geriatric section also was the most apparent section for my first reason why I never want to be in prison: The smell!
The official metric unit for smell is the NH. This stands for Nursing Home. Remember back when Lichto taught us that smell is the best way to rate a nursing home? See! I was listening. Anyway, for any of you who have ever visited a nursing home, they smell like old people. While an NH is defined as the average smell concentration of a nursing home, the geriatric section goes way stronger. Picture about 100 8' X 8' areas all in one room with dividing walls that come only about 4 feet up from the floor. This is what the geriatric area is like. Each area houses one geriatric offender, and these offenders shower less than normal old people and eat grosser food than normal old people. Now picture the power of all that stink rising and fermenting in the air. I didn't have a smellometer with me, but I am estimating that this area was running anywhere from 10-20 NH, which is practically off the charts. While other units aren't as smelly, they still average around 3 NH.
Upon reading that last paragraph, some of you might get the impression that I don't like old people. That is not necessarily true. I love my grandma very much, possibly more than any other person in the world.
Small side story: While in the geriatric area, one cute little old man started complaining to Tony about how Tony wasn't giving him the care he needed. He looked like the type of old guy that if you saw on the street, you would say "awwww!" He was small and he had giant glasses on that looked to be about as thick as an inch. The inmates all love Tony and generally treat medical staff very well because they understand that the medical staff can make their lives hell by not treating them. I learned later that the guy who was complaining was in the prison for killing 6 people.
A reminder that I am in Texas...
While so far, all this could probably be experienced in any prison system, there were certain aspects that made my experience a Texas experience. First was meeting the warden. Picture what you would expect a Texas prison warden to look like... that's what he looked like, minus the goatee. When we came into his office, he was leaning back on his rocking chair with his shoes off and eating a pecan pie. Later on in the conversation, his secretary came in with his newly polished cowboy boots. I cannot make something this wonderful up.
The second Texas experience is coincedentally the second reason why I never want to go to prison (see how I worked that in? Pretty clever, ain't I). That is the food. I had the prison food when I visited the Lychner Unit (many often mispronounce it Lynchner) a couple months ago. I had chicken fried steak and baked beans. For the bakes beans, image beans that were soaked in luke warm water just enough to be soft and then left in the water. It was awful, but it was still better than the steak. I take pride in finishing food no matter how awful it is. Something must have stuck when my parents would say the starving children in Africa line when I was young, so I never let anything go to waste. The steak was so awful that I can't even describe it, nor could I finish it.
However, when I was in Huntsville, we went to McKensie's for lunch. Texas is known for its bbq and McKensie's is the cream of the crop for Texas bbq. It was so delicious that I had a rage blackout when eating there. Supposedly, I didn't speak a single word throughout lunch.
Well that is it about prison. One day I might talk about my work experience, and I promise that is fun and interesting too, but no one wants to hear about how I saved the organization $48k in charges for plastic forks. I also am taking on a new challenge as interim manager of our volunteer services. Hope everyone is doing well and still waiting to hear some others discuss their sweet experiences.
PS... If you were wondering, the third reason is not freedom. Remember that I started this blog post saying that I'm lazy. Freedom just means you get to walk around more, which takes energy. The actual third reason is women.
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