Time Keeps on Slippin...

My world trembled a little bit when I heard the first words come out of good old Wayne’s mouth, 25 to life. The next words from God in heaven were “Stayed”. On and on it went until for what seemed like hours. On the news that night I was told by pretty little reporters that I could be expected to see freedom once again anywhere from 5 to 25 years. Not one was accurate about how much time I would spend in the big house. Hell, as I sit here writing this remembering what it felt like to have my time given to me, the relief I felt that I could finally get moving toward my future whatever that was going to be.
For the past year and 9 months I had seen amazingly great and amazingly horrible reactions to the issuance of time. Some women came back onto the module and they were happy beyond measure that their attorney had found some loop hole and they were being released that night. Others, one red head in particular was so destroyed by her sentence of thirty days that, that evening when we had been released for day room. She walked up to the top tier, almost directly over the cop station, climbed over the rail, and jumped trying to kill herself. I was on the top tier on the other side of the module and was too far away to get to her to stop her and could only watch. Jumping off the tier was a quick trip to the hospital, pain meds and escape from their current reality. Of all the women who used the leap of the tier as their method to escape their time not one of them succeeded. They simply added a broken back of broken feet to the already complicated situation. Also they usually went to the psych ward which was even more restrictive than E module, causing their movements to be scrutinized even more, less freedom.

Storm Shelter

The only benefit of being the oldest girl in the children’s shelter is being allowed entrance into the children’s storm shelter baby room. Each of the babies in this room had been abused or mistreated by their caregivers. I could understand that right? One day I was in the baby room, which was markedly the sunniest place inside the storm shelter. There was one little baby boy, his skin was dark, whether by birth or by the burns his mother had put all over him, I don’t know. My inner sun felt pulled to this squalling bundle of pain. The nurse in the room cautioned me that any touch was severely painful to this little boy, yet my heart was pulled to him. I gently bent over his stark white crib, he seemed so tiny, fragile, and lonely. Everyone seemed to steer clear of him in fear of causing him pain leaving him abandoned to human touch. I slid one hand under his scarred head and my other hand slid around his body as I picked him up. I brought him into my chest, holding him next to my heart, all the while humming to him softly as he screamed in pain. Within a minute his heart wrenching screams subsided as his inner storm passed. I held him all day long, and hated to put him back down. I fed him that day, pouring my overabundant and under given love to this beautiful little boy.

Storms

Storms take all shapes and sizes. My beginning was a storm of failed gender and Mom giving up on her life. This storm blew out as they always do and right on its heals the next storm blew in. This storm was young too, had fire red hair and an even redder temper. This storm blew across my nose in the form of her fist because I had forgotten to brush my teeth before preschool. Something a wise four year old should have remembered to do. Her storm raged even redder as she saw the blood mixed with tears running rivers down my tiny face. How dare I make her feel guilty for making her unleash her storms ferocious power on me to correct my erroneous ways. The enraged red headed storm finally blew out when the sun’s rays found a crack in the storm shining light into my darkness. The sun came to me in the form of a nosy neighbor, Laura, who spoke the light of truth in the face of the red headed storm making the red headed storm flee. Yet, just like every other storm she left destruction I her path. Her winds magically carried away every possession within the house, but the house remained only an empty shell. Her winds managed to pick up my tiny clothes, tiny toy trucks, and my tiny little girl furniture. Tornado Dad took off after the red headed storm like a mad storm chaser he finally catches up with her. Only to be given one more wallops as all storms do, in the form of a hard ceramic coffee mug meeting Tornado dad’s cranium.