Posts
A reminder: a peace vigil will take place for LeAnne and peace, every Wednesday from 5:15 in the CTS Hilton Chapel. (The small chapel on the first floor.) There will be someone there for at least an hour, and the chapel will be open after that.
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4/16: My hand hurts and I don't feel much like writing but my brain is busy so it might be good to do so anyway.
Today I sent off some cartoons I'd drawn about life in jail, which I'll hopefully copy onto the website eventually. The first was pictures of what we eat (beanie-weenie, beanie-without-weenie, and beanie-with-mystery-meat) plus a prison version of upside-down cake (frosting on the bottom so it doesn't stick to the stack of trays.) I also did one of all possible party costumes you could construct from prison-issue clothing and linens (a pillow case makes a good tail for a tiger, since you're already in orange and black). This las one I sent to Mom for her 60th birthday card, since she has always liked my cartoon characters. Her birthday is the 18th.
I also wrote several letters by dictation/translation for our immigrant friends here who are still without representation- so we're writing to legal aid agencies. This was a multi-national effort, since I'm rather slow on both Spanish translation and legal options for immigrants. So my Romanian [sp?] friend helped me with the legal part and both Mexican friends and I pieced the rest together. I also wrote a letter for my Korean friend whose American husband of 30 years seems to have forgotten all about her. No phone, visits, or letters in all this time, and no money for comissary to get shampoo and such. So we quit writing letters to the husband and are now getting legal help for her directly. Meanwhile, of course they threaten to deport her. What does a 63 year old woman do back in Korea when she's been gone 30 years? All her family is gone. So it is a difficult situation. Meanwhile, the husband of one of my Mexican friends found a lawyer, but the lawyer took their money and didn't work on the case. Now they have nothing to pay a new lawyer.
4/17: Comissary arrived today, and we stood on the floor with our pillow cases like eager trick or treaters. I have envelopes for me, and moe pencils. Another notepad didn't come through. I think I can make do, though, with the backs of received letters. I order as many as I can but still run out of something by the end of the week for letter-writing. In the meantime, we'll hold a party tonight with our snack goodies- one woman who his here is honoring the birthday of her fiance, who died one month ago tomorrow, from a drug overdose. So we will all contribute something- a sort of potluck.
Last night I went to "Celebrate Recovery" which is an Evangelical 12 step/8 principle program which kind of covers all the ailments and addictions at once- from alcohol and narcotics to food, anger, and workaholism- the latter being why I thought I might sign up. I did include some good, intensive life-sharing, which I think really benefitted everyone, and it also made me a little more empathetic for the Fundamentalist laywoman running the program. I do understand that religious traditions based on controland rigidity are very appealing to people who feel their lives are out of control. Many of the women here said they need it, so I am becoming more careful in how I criticize it. But I also still challenge words of intolerance- attacks on LGBTQ people and people of other faiths.
All cozy now in my cell and working on getting these letters written! Today, since the guards have not yet confiscated my "excess correspondence" as contraband (gee) I've lined up all my greeting cards on the top bunk. Church (UCHP) has sent so many cheerful floral cards, it is now like having a garden in my little cell. I'll try to get away with it as long as I can. It is helping to dispel my "mid-sentence grouchies." All the letters do help keep my spirits up, I realize this most over the weekend when there's no mail. Some of the women truly never get mail. I try to share the poetry, the pictures, etc., at breakfast mail call, and I hope to collect "out-dates" for some of the women who will be here later than me.
There is an A&E documentary on Matthew Shephard on tv now, and many of the girls are rapt with attention to the screen. This is good. There is quite a bit of homophobia here, not just from the Prison Fellowship folks but among the women. Also rampant among guards and inmates is a dislike of immigrants- where they are mostly ignored by the other women, or of the kind where immigrants as a whole are maligned but the few here are made known to be exceptions. Those of us who can, help with the letter writing, translation, and sharing comissary goods.
I found out in a letter from a classmate yesterday that there is a weekly peace vigil at the seminary while I am away. I don't know who has organized it or who's attending, but I am very touched by it. It is good to know not only that I am loved and remembered, but also that folks "outside" are working on the cause for which I've gone to jail in the first place.
We are guessing these days perhaps the food has a sedative effect- it is heavily starch and fat, and veggie/fruit servings quite scarce. But most of us are pretty subdued this week, going back to bed as soon as wwe finish eating, and tough to wake up in the morning. I imagine we're "sugar-crashing." Although the younger ones might be quite "sugared-up" for the weekend, having ordered extra comissary.
I've drawn another little picture just now, of my cell, as it might look when you walk in the door. You'll have to picture me in a blanket shawl as usual, either writing at the desk or on the bunk. The hop/swing out seat can be comfortable enough for a while, but the bed allows more space to lay out papers. [I put the picture up on the bulletin board of CTS Room 133. –David]
Please pray for my friend in court today, trying to get into rehab and get her child and cats back. Please pray for the women who are forgotten here, for the immigrants, and for those scared to be here, and the women who cry by the phones. Peace to you and I hope to see you soon.
LeAnne
Showing posts with label food. Show all posts
Showing posts with label food. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Sunday, April 13, 2008
Notes from My Cell, April 13-14th
4/13
I am pretty comfortable in my cell, I hope not too comfortable, but after all, I seek out monastic retreats where I’ve just got a little cell to sit with myself, catch up on sleep perhaps, and write. I’ve been thinking of stripping my room down this summer to just such a situation. My room has been my office and my study for too long, and it does impact the quality of my sleep. This last winter I learned to spend time in my red chair, angled towards the window, where I got a little light and could watch the city and its people just go about its business. I think it began to click, that this was in some ways a spiritual discipline to be valued, earlier – before Christmas, when I got the opportunity to meet Martin Marty in his office and home in the Hancock tower. The whole world, it seems, is buzzing away below. (I especially liked the line of cars up and down all of Lake Shore Drive). But it does quickly give you a different perspective on life, floating above it like that. So that is what I try to do now also – take in that bustling corner of Hyde Park with its Metra trains and buses and people arriving and departing, the bank and the bookstore, and all.
For this reason also, I think, I am happy to have been bounced up to the second floor of cells in our block – where I can get a wider, “birds-eye” perspective on our daily lives in this jail, how we buzz about playing cards, helping one another, fighting with one another, all engrossed in a movie on TV, the crying and hand-holding by the phone, and the laughing at lunch table pranks. It also gets a little more sun during the day.
I think I’ve collected nearly enough information to begin a license investigation into the night nurse – the one who routinely refuses to distribute prescribed medication to inmates during her shift, or to tell inmates their prescription has expired – although the other nurses will show us that the prescription is still in place. One testimony I collected is from a young inmate who suffered a miscarriage late in her first trimester. When this nurse was on duty and called, she told the girl to “bleed it out in (her) cell.” That was about two years ago. We do apparently have a very good medical ward here, by most prisoners’ accounts, but it amazes me a nurse wouldn’t do anything. Meanwhile, I’m wondering just what this nurse is doing with all the drugs she’s withholding from her patients. (Worse is the girl who went into premature labor on an already high risk pregnancy this past summer; the nurse told her it was only a bladder infection. When the next nurse came on shift, she finally got to go to the hospital).
--
9:15 and we are waiting for cell inspections – a daily ritual of checking our beds are neat and cells tidy, and no “contraband” lying out in the open. Today, I have two religious books – a Bible and a Qur’an, when you’re only allowed one; and I made a pencil-grip out of paper strips rolled, and secured with a sticky shampoo label. I also have too many photos and letters from the outside – when I finish with them, they’re supposed to go downstairs into my personal belongings container – but in my defense on this last one, I’ve asked three different guards so far, and none have bothered; they also didn’t touch it during shakedown.
--
4/14
Monday afternoon, a beautiful sun shining, I can see through the window; I find myself especially at peace today. It is good to enter jail in late winter, when you haven’t experienced spring yet – in fact, it will be marvelous to step out into full bloom a few weeks from now. Then it may be hard to keep me inside to finish my studies the last two weeks of school.
--
I just remember I forgot to call back the Witherspoon Society. Perhaps I can be of use to them still after my release. (A Presbyterian peace group).
--
I confess the past several days I’ve done little more than read, write, and catch up on sleep – I felt a little guilty about this – I should be writing more! Reading more! But, on the other hand, it also feels like time well spent. Curiously enough, the whole ward’s been doing much the same. We’ve been quieter as a whole, too.
I answered some questions about religious life, training towards the pastorate, as well as formation as a nun; I explained what I could. I think often about bringing together various religious orders for a conversation with the New Monasticism movement, the Catholic Workers and the student cooperative housing movement, and I think also the interfaith youth movement. Here are five groups that have so much to share with one another and enormous potential to provide young adults something meaningful to do other than hope to work for good.
So many tears tonight – on the phone again – from those coming in tonight, and from those who are about to leave. It is a nurturing group of women here who look out for one another and its ok to cry around. I can see how it would be hard to exist on the “outside” world without this support.
--
All I can think about tonight is food. The tv commercials are not helping – nor is my co-food-thinker who’s getting out tomorrow. You just don’t know how much that Dunkin Donuts commercial for coffee hurt to watch, especially the last scene with the chocolate-covered custard-filled – it’s a particular weakness… I am envisioning a day of pure comfort food when I get out, followed by many days of nonstop vegetables. No pasta surprise, and no beanie weenie for at least a month, okay? I also confess I dream of pizza. Fortunately, they do a nice treat for the inmates – they take orders every other Friday from a local restaurant, this week it will be a sub – we’ll divide up the ones we get for the women who have no money on their commissary accounts, just as we do with the candy. We’re charged a reasonable price, too – around $5. I am glad to have resources to share here. Also glad that when I leave my cellmates will have my things to share – shampoo, and things like this that I needed to order when I got here. Also hopefully a few leftover writing supplies, though I go through them fast.
--
I’m beginning to think already of the time when I will be done here. It is coming soon.
Peace,
Le Anne
I am pretty comfortable in my cell, I hope not too comfortable, but after all, I seek out monastic retreats where I’ve just got a little cell to sit with myself, catch up on sleep perhaps, and write. I’ve been thinking of stripping my room down this summer to just such a situation. My room has been my office and my study for too long, and it does impact the quality of my sleep. This last winter I learned to spend time in my red chair, angled towards the window, where I got a little light and could watch the city and its people just go about its business. I think it began to click, that this was in some ways a spiritual discipline to be valued, earlier – before Christmas, when I got the opportunity to meet Martin Marty in his office and home in the Hancock tower. The whole world, it seems, is buzzing away below. (I especially liked the line of cars up and down all of Lake Shore Drive). But it does quickly give you a different perspective on life, floating above it like that. So that is what I try to do now also – take in that bustling corner of Hyde Park with its Metra trains and buses and people arriving and departing, the bank and the bookstore, and all.
For this reason also, I think, I am happy to have been bounced up to the second floor of cells in our block – where I can get a wider, “birds-eye” perspective on our daily lives in this jail, how we buzz about playing cards, helping one another, fighting with one another, all engrossed in a movie on TV, the crying and hand-holding by the phone, and the laughing at lunch table pranks. It also gets a little more sun during the day.
I think I’ve collected nearly enough information to begin a license investigation into the night nurse – the one who routinely refuses to distribute prescribed medication to inmates during her shift, or to tell inmates their prescription has expired – although the other nurses will show us that the prescription is still in place. One testimony I collected is from a young inmate who suffered a miscarriage late in her first trimester. When this nurse was on duty and called, she told the girl to “bleed it out in (her) cell.” That was about two years ago. We do apparently have a very good medical ward here, by most prisoners’ accounts, but it amazes me a nurse wouldn’t do anything. Meanwhile, I’m wondering just what this nurse is doing with all the drugs she’s withholding from her patients. (Worse is the girl who went into premature labor on an already high risk pregnancy this past summer; the nurse told her it was only a bladder infection. When the next nurse came on shift, she finally got to go to the hospital).
--
9:15 and we are waiting for cell inspections – a daily ritual of checking our beds are neat and cells tidy, and no “contraband” lying out in the open. Today, I have two religious books – a Bible and a Qur’an, when you’re only allowed one; and I made a pencil-grip out of paper strips rolled, and secured with a sticky shampoo label. I also have too many photos and letters from the outside – when I finish with them, they’re supposed to go downstairs into my personal belongings container – but in my defense on this last one, I’ve asked three different guards so far, and none have bothered; they also didn’t touch it during shakedown.
--
4/14
Monday afternoon, a beautiful sun shining, I can see through the window; I find myself especially at peace today. It is good to enter jail in late winter, when you haven’t experienced spring yet – in fact, it will be marvelous to step out into full bloom a few weeks from now. Then it may be hard to keep me inside to finish my studies the last two weeks of school.
--
I just remember I forgot to call back the Witherspoon Society. Perhaps I can be of use to them still after my release. (A Presbyterian peace group).
--
I confess the past several days I’ve done little more than read, write, and catch up on sleep – I felt a little guilty about this – I should be writing more! Reading more! But, on the other hand, it also feels like time well spent. Curiously enough, the whole ward’s been doing much the same. We’ve been quieter as a whole, too.
I answered some questions about religious life, training towards the pastorate, as well as formation as a nun; I explained what I could. I think often about bringing together various religious orders for a conversation with the New Monasticism movement, the Catholic Workers and the student cooperative housing movement, and I think also the interfaith youth movement. Here are five groups that have so much to share with one another and enormous potential to provide young adults something meaningful to do other than hope to work for good.
So many tears tonight – on the phone again – from those coming in tonight, and from those who are about to leave. It is a nurturing group of women here who look out for one another and its ok to cry around. I can see how it would be hard to exist on the “outside” world without this support.
--
All I can think about tonight is food. The tv commercials are not helping – nor is my co-food-thinker who’s getting out tomorrow. You just don’t know how much that Dunkin Donuts commercial for coffee hurt to watch, especially the last scene with the chocolate-covered custard-filled – it’s a particular weakness… I am envisioning a day of pure comfort food when I get out, followed by many days of nonstop vegetables. No pasta surprise, and no beanie weenie for at least a month, okay? I also confess I dream of pizza. Fortunately, they do a nice treat for the inmates – they take orders every other Friday from a local restaurant, this week it will be a sub – we’ll divide up the ones we get for the women who have no money on their commissary accounts, just as we do with the candy. We’re charged a reasonable price, too – around $5. I am glad to have resources to share here. Also glad that when I leave my cellmates will have my things to share – shampoo, and things like this that I needed to order when I got here. Also hopefully a few leftover writing supplies, though I go through them fast.
--
I’m beginning to think already of the time when I will be done here. It is coming soon.
Peace,
Le Anne
Friday, April 11, 2008
Notes from My Cell, April 11
[An activist couple sent me an Emma Goldman portrait/history greeting card, which I translated out loud in Spanish for our few ICE detainee friends; the card itself was so popular among the women I didn’t see it for a few days. It finally came back today – was stuck in someone’s Bible.
Most of us do go to Bible Study and “Church,” but it’s pretty clear both of these are led by horribly under-trained and fundamentalist volunteers. Except for their sweet suburban mom faces, not a lot of love or real Gospel. It’s also definitively geared toward conversion, which is what some girls are asking for – interesting to me to see who enjoys this and who doesn’t. I’ve been thinking a lot about how to capture fundamentalist persuasion and couple it with a more welcoming gospel of love and justice. For example, could you couple the style of Joel Osteen with lessons of good/just stewardship of money and your whole person, or a discussion on systems of poverty?
Today we had ‘Shakedown’ which is when they pull apart your cell and also frisk you good looking for contraband. Fortunately, I’m good to go, they only confiscated one of my pencils, which was really two golf pencils taped together.
Fortunately, I arrived some time after they ended the practice of strip AND cavity searches during shakedown, although they still strip search when you first come in. It’s also good to be aware that cameras and guards – male and female – are watching everything you do, at all hours of the day. Even when using the toilet and shower, and changing clothes. I’ve adopted a manner of modesty-plus-gutsiness, and it doesn’t buy me as much now. It helps to remember at that point, I am just a number.
I saw a cake fight tonight, which is actually round three over about as many days. Each day we do get dessert, a nice surprise, one meal is two cookies, and the other meal is cake. So, one woman was eating bits of the other’s cake while she wasn’t watching. So the ‘victim’ grabbed the rest of the cake and smooshed it in her face, like they do at obnoxious weddings. So, when the next cake dinner came around, the “thief” grabbed a handful and shoved it down the front of the other’s shirt. On round three, she returned the favor. I was laughing so hard I fell off my stool. Glad they didn’t go for the mashed potatoes, and also that they’re good friends.
I confess that I have eaten far too many of the “Nutty Bars” since they arrived in commissary on Thursday – healthy food is hard to come by. Supper is at 4:00 PM, so it’s easy to get hungry at night, and we’re not supposed to take food from dinner back to our cells. (Fortunately, the cookie I did abscond with after lunch I did eat BEFORE shakedown.)
Would you believe I actually spent the weekend napping and reading books for fun in BED? How long has it been? Probably not since I started seminary, with the exception of the Harry Potter books this summer. Usually, I have enough school reading to do that if I do have free time, I don’t want to do more, so that was a nice perk.
I actually don’t mind my cell, it does offer a certain “monastic” function that I was hoping for – just a bed and a desk and the sink/toilet. I do find it a quiet alternative to the dayroom, which has a usually loud TV and everyone playing cards; so when I feel like I’ve been social enough for the day, I head up to read, write, or nap. The next project is to read the entire Quran through, and perhaps all of Paul – the latter at the suggestion of the new chaplain (who, by comparison to the regular volunteers I think actually is pretty good) who suggested as a young pastor I might find more in Paul’s writings as a prisoner among prisoners sharing and thinking Gospel. We’ll see what happens.
4/11/08 – Every night I am here I watch girls cry, usually on the phone, usually because someone hasn’t come to bond them out. This is a pervasive strain in the unit, the issue of bond. The people who are here, for the most part, are people who can’t afford to not be here. My roommate, who finally got out today, went through a terribly painful ordeal as her family went to each member and friend, borrowing money, expecting them to make it back here before each deadline, still not enough, pawning more possessions, again not enough, dissolving into tears after being so hopeful day after day, that they’d already packed. Another girl was given rising bail - $2000 the day of court, $3,000 next, $4,000 the next – or off to prison for the next three years without a chance to go home after sentencing. Federal cases are worse, you may spend years in this building while your case is being processed, and never see the light of day past your six inch window strip. Two girls here are in this predicament. I am extremely lucky. I have a definite ‘out date.’ The chaplain I met with this week suggested I focus my Bible study on Paul, who pastured and taught even as he was a prisoner among prisoners, that this might be a good frame and function for me as a young pastor behind bars. For those of you who pray, pray this week for my young friends in the Holy Name 6, who were treated quite badly in police custody after their nonviolent protest against the war Easter Sunday. They are young, but I think they have admirable convictions. If you can, please contribute to their legal support on my behalf. Many thanks, Peace, LeAnne.
Most of us do go to Bible Study and “Church,” but it’s pretty clear both of these are led by horribly under-trained and fundamentalist volunteers. Except for their sweet suburban mom faces, not a lot of love or real Gospel. It’s also definitively geared toward conversion, which is what some girls are asking for – interesting to me to see who enjoys this and who doesn’t. I’ve been thinking a lot about how to capture fundamentalist persuasion and couple it with a more welcoming gospel of love and justice. For example, could you couple the style of Joel Osteen with lessons of good/just stewardship of money and your whole person, or a discussion on systems of poverty?
Today we had ‘Shakedown’ which is when they pull apart your cell and also frisk you good looking for contraband. Fortunately, I’m good to go, they only confiscated one of my pencils, which was really two golf pencils taped together.
Fortunately, I arrived some time after they ended the practice of strip AND cavity searches during shakedown, although they still strip search when you first come in. It’s also good to be aware that cameras and guards – male and female – are watching everything you do, at all hours of the day. Even when using the toilet and shower, and changing clothes. I’ve adopted a manner of modesty-plus-gutsiness, and it doesn’t buy me as much now. It helps to remember at that point, I am just a number.
I saw a cake fight tonight, which is actually round three over about as many days. Each day we do get dessert, a nice surprise, one meal is two cookies, and the other meal is cake. So, one woman was eating bits of the other’s cake while she wasn’t watching. So the ‘victim’ grabbed the rest of the cake and smooshed it in her face, like they do at obnoxious weddings. So, when the next cake dinner came around, the “thief” grabbed a handful and shoved it down the front of the other’s shirt. On round three, she returned the favor. I was laughing so hard I fell off my stool. Glad they didn’t go for the mashed potatoes, and also that they’re good friends.
I confess that I have eaten far too many of the “Nutty Bars” since they arrived in commissary on Thursday – healthy food is hard to come by. Supper is at 4:00 PM, so it’s easy to get hungry at night, and we’re not supposed to take food from dinner back to our cells. (Fortunately, the cookie I did abscond with after lunch I did eat BEFORE shakedown.)
Would you believe I actually spent the weekend napping and reading books for fun in BED? How long has it been? Probably not since I started seminary, with the exception of the Harry Potter books this summer. Usually, I have enough school reading to do that if I do have free time, I don’t want to do more, so that was a nice perk.
I actually don’t mind my cell, it does offer a certain “monastic” function that I was hoping for – just a bed and a desk and the sink/toilet. I do find it a quiet alternative to the dayroom, which has a usually loud TV and everyone playing cards; so when I feel like I’ve been social enough for the day, I head up to read, write, or nap. The next project is to read the entire Quran through, and perhaps all of Paul – the latter at the suggestion of the new chaplain (who, by comparison to the regular volunteers I think actually is pretty good) who suggested as a young pastor I might find more in Paul’s writings as a prisoner among prisoners sharing and thinking Gospel. We’ll see what happens.
4/11/08 – Every night I am here I watch girls cry, usually on the phone, usually because someone hasn’t come to bond them out. This is a pervasive strain in the unit, the issue of bond. The people who are here, for the most part, are people who can’t afford to not be here. My roommate, who finally got out today, went through a terribly painful ordeal as her family went to each member and friend, borrowing money, expecting them to make it back here before each deadline, still not enough, pawning more possessions, again not enough, dissolving into tears after being so hopeful day after day, that they’d already packed. Another girl was given rising bail - $2000 the day of court, $3,000 next, $4,000 the next – or off to prison for the next three years without a chance to go home after sentencing. Federal cases are worse, you may spend years in this building while your case is being processed, and never see the light of day past your six inch window strip. Two girls here are in this predicament. I am extremely lucky. I have a definite ‘out date.’ The chaplain I met with this week suggested I focus my Bible study on Paul, who pastured and taught even as he was a prisoner among prisoners, that this might be a good frame and function for me as a young pastor behind bars. For those of you who pray, pray this week for my young friends in the Holy Name 6, who were treated quite badly in police custody after their nonviolent protest against the war Easter Sunday. They are young, but I think they have admirable convictions. If you can, please contribute to their legal support on my behalf. Many thanks, Peace, LeAnne.
Sunday, April 06, 2008
Notes from My Cell, April 6
I wonder what I’ll be like when I get out of here. A month without real church, a month of deep muscle aches and no relief, a month of obeying orders. I do try to dignify certain moments, such as looking the guards and male prisoners in the eye when I am receiving a meal or giving the tray back, and saying thank you, rather than complaining about what we’re served.
----
I wear my pencil down too quickly when writing and have ordered more, since I can’t get up to sharpen them in the dayroom at night. It can also be frustrating only being able to switch between lockdown (cell) and dayroom (group) only every four hours during the day.
----
Life happens here so early. I’m up around 5, which is unheard of; we’re done with breakfast @ 6:30 and dayroom and floors are cleaned and showers and then we wait around an hour or two before cell inspection. Lunch at 11 & dinner @ 4, you could almost go to bed by 6pm. The days feel very long this way.
----
I am afraid to be cut off even this long. I could email from Iran & reach everyone, even check my bank account and bills. Hopefully, all will be settled just fine. I know I won’t be forgotten, it’s just anxiety. The next letter, the loss of a visit due to the schedule, and the inability to get stamps for this first week are all taking on too much importance.
---
I’ve been told prison is easier than here by some of the women who’ve been to both. Prison actually offers more freedom, they said, and the chance to go outside, the chance to work. Also they said the food is better, and you get more, and there’s coffee. I do miss coffee. We get a cup of lukewarm instant in the morning. They said commissary is also better – you can get more useful things. One lady has been to most of the prisons around for DUI. She has three kids, grown, and is the nicest “mom” you can imagine. So sweet, I feel sad for her.
---
I had really not anticipated the degree of physical pain and discomfort. After four days only of cold, small steel bench or cold, steel bed with a thin mattress, not much eases the muscle and joint pain. Not even yoga, not even walking. I probably wake up to muscle cramps as often as to night checks. I hope I adapt soon. I’ll get a few Tylenol through commissary and hope it might help, too. Otherwise, I just try to keep moving.
----
I wear my pencil down too quickly when writing and have ordered more, since I can’t get up to sharpen them in the dayroom at night. It can also be frustrating only being able to switch between lockdown (cell) and dayroom (group) only every four hours during the day.
----
Life happens here so early. I’m up around 5, which is unheard of; we’re done with breakfast @ 6:30 and dayroom and floors are cleaned and showers and then we wait around an hour or two before cell inspection. Lunch at 11 & dinner @ 4, you could almost go to bed by 6pm. The days feel very long this way.
----
I am afraid to be cut off even this long. I could email from Iran & reach everyone, even check my bank account and bills. Hopefully, all will be settled just fine. I know I won’t be forgotten, it’s just anxiety. The next letter, the loss of a visit due to the schedule, and the inability to get stamps for this first week are all taking on too much importance.
---
I’ve been told prison is easier than here by some of the women who’ve been to both. Prison actually offers more freedom, they said, and the chance to go outside, the chance to work. Also they said the food is better, and you get more, and there’s coffee. I do miss coffee. We get a cup of lukewarm instant in the morning. They said commissary is also better – you can get more useful things. One lady has been to most of the prisons around for DUI. She has three kids, grown, and is the nicest “mom” you can imagine. So sweet, I feel sad for her.
---
I had really not anticipated the degree of physical pain and discomfort. After four days only of cold, small steel bench or cold, steel bed with a thin mattress, not much eases the muscle and joint pain. Not even yoga, not even walking. I probably wake up to muscle cramps as often as to night checks. I hope I adapt soon. I’ll get a few Tylenol through commissary and hope it might help, too. Otherwise, I just try to keep moving.
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
The Food Stamp Challenge
Aaron Krager on Faithfully Liberal posted on the 'Food Stamp Challenge' and wrote about the experience of trying to buy a week's worth of food at the same dollar amount as a person on food stamps receives, $21.00 per week.
Technically, I realize, I would ‘win’ the food stamp challenge. I spend between $12–$24 per week on groceries. And I eat healthy and don’t go hungry when doing so. The ‘catch’ is that I only shop at the Hyde Park Produce mart (regularly, though I go about once a month to an Arab grocer’s or to Trader Joe’s), buy only what’s in season, and generally shop vegetarian.
However, I realize also this is only after a decade of practice and having done a lot of research on how to accomplish this (nutrition planning as well as living in other countries as well as figuring out which stores), and that I don’t have a partner or children– ‘advantages’ in winning the food war.
That’s not to say that if only food stamp people got better educated, they could make it work. There’s only one store where I can make this work in my neighborhood, four grocers where it certainly wouldn’t work, and no grocers at all in the distressed neighborhood (Woodlawn) where I work as a student pastor. I also know that some weeks if an emergency comes up, a paycheck doesn’t arrive when it should, or an extra bill comes up, the food budget might get wiped out altogether. Such was the case these past two weeks when a medical bill wiped out the last of my finances for the summer, though similar events have happened during my three years in seminary. On these occasions, I need to rely on events with food at school, or on friends or relatives to host me for a few meals a week–the seminarian’s form of a soup kitchen. Or sometimes I’m too proud or ashamed to admit I couldn’t make the ends meet on my own, and I just don’t eat.
I also know that my appetite isn’t often what it was when I was a growing child, particularly when I was one of five growing children in a family who was dependent on food assistance, and my mother was a very coupon/price conscious working nurse. Even when I was eight I was well aware it cost less to eat low-nutrition and ‘junk’ foods than it was to eat healthy foods when shopping at most stores. I also know that although both my parents worked regular blue-collar jobs, medical bills would push us over the line. Most folks find the same problem. And most folks, to my knowledge, that need food stamps do work.
I think I write all this in response to two silent but often-thought questions: who is really ‘poor’, and who deserves to eat. A person who works regularly or is a full-time student is not seen as being authentically ‘poor’ (I might add that most seminarians seem truly afraid of those who look or talk about being poor); and it’s a faulty assumption that a person who doesn’t have enough to eat is lazy or incompetent to work or manage their affairs or uneducated. Nobody who looked at me would assume I am poor or grew up in poverty. It’s true that I currently choose to remain a full-time student, after realizing I would be in deeper debt if I dropped to part-time and took longer to go to school. That is more choice than most people have. I also hope to choose to work in settings where I never live over the poverty line, in order to be more authentically among the poor. Still, whether living in chosen or unchosen forms of poverty, I know as a seminary student I need to speak up in the presence of my classmates on poverty issues and people, to transform the way we teach and learn how to be ministers, and how we respond in the course of our daily lives.
peace,
Le Anne
Technically, I realize, I would ‘win’ the food stamp challenge. I spend between $12–$24 per week on groceries. And I eat healthy and don’t go hungry when doing so. The ‘catch’ is that I only shop at the Hyde Park Produce mart (regularly, though I go about once a month to an Arab grocer’s or to Trader Joe’s), buy only what’s in season, and generally shop vegetarian.
However, I realize also this is only after a decade of practice and having done a lot of research on how to accomplish this (nutrition planning as well as living in other countries as well as figuring out which stores), and that I don’t have a partner or children– ‘advantages’ in winning the food war.
That’s not to say that if only food stamp people got better educated, they could make it work. There’s only one store where I can make this work in my neighborhood, four grocers where it certainly wouldn’t work, and no grocers at all in the distressed neighborhood (Woodlawn) where I work as a student pastor. I also know that some weeks if an emergency comes up, a paycheck doesn’t arrive when it should, or an extra bill comes up, the food budget might get wiped out altogether. Such was the case these past two weeks when a medical bill wiped out the last of my finances for the summer, though similar events have happened during my three years in seminary. On these occasions, I need to rely on events with food at school, or on friends or relatives to host me for a few meals a week–the seminarian’s form of a soup kitchen. Or sometimes I’m too proud or ashamed to admit I couldn’t make the ends meet on my own, and I just don’t eat.
I also know that my appetite isn’t often what it was when I was a growing child, particularly when I was one of five growing children in a family who was dependent on food assistance, and my mother was a very coupon/price conscious working nurse. Even when I was eight I was well aware it cost less to eat low-nutrition and ‘junk’ foods than it was to eat healthy foods when shopping at most stores. I also know that although both my parents worked regular blue-collar jobs, medical bills would push us over the line. Most folks find the same problem. And most folks, to my knowledge, that need food stamps do work.
I think I write all this in response to two silent but often-thought questions: who is really ‘poor’, and who deserves to eat. A person who works regularly or is a full-time student is not seen as being authentically ‘poor’ (I might add that most seminarians seem truly afraid of those who look or talk about being poor); and it’s a faulty assumption that a person who doesn’t have enough to eat is lazy or incompetent to work or manage their affairs or uneducated. Nobody who looked at me would assume I am poor or grew up in poverty. It’s true that I currently choose to remain a full-time student, after realizing I would be in deeper debt if I dropped to part-time and took longer to go to school. That is more choice than most people have. I also hope to choose to work in settings where I never live over the poverty line, in order to be more authentically among the poor. Still, whether living in chosen or unchosen forms of poverty, I know as a seminary student I need to speak up in the presence of my classmates on poverty issues and people, to transform the way we teach and learn how to be ministers, and how we respond in the course of our daily lives.
peace,
Le Anne
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