Being incarcerated has really been a twist of fate throughout the years of dealing with heartbreaks, losing love ones, being oppressed by cynical racist C’O’s, but throughout it all I have developed patients and gained wisdom from the words of the serenity prayer that clearly states: “O God” Give me the ability and strength to deal with the things that I can, and the courage to accept the things which I can not”. Incarceration has been a ride of a matrix roller coaster for me but traveling through this road of life, I am able to look back and say “I survived.” I’m still here standing tall like city hall like a grounded statue of one of the greats! One of the most devastating twists of fate occured when this innocuous virus called Covid 19 hit my prison. The chile hall was closed, visitations were taken, classes & programs were closed, and all inmates received 45 minutes out per day of our man caves to shower, use the phone, plug up our tablets to the kiosk, then it was back to our cells, and to top it all off everyone were mandated to wear masks. Throughout my prison, covid became like a game of tag because if you touched it or it touched you then you were it. Tragically 4 inmates has passed away in my facility, (SCI Forest) due to this deadly wildfire virus and it has killed over 500,000 in the US today and still counting. I am proud and lucky enough to admit that I was one of the dodgers of this tragic game of tag called the coronavirus and I can advertly say that I am truly blessed especially being in my cell with a younger cell mate who contracted Covid 19, and lost his taste and smell, and I myself never caught it, and this was a time when I maybe was the most paranoid and schizophrenic in my entire life, and all I could do was wash my hands 80 times a day and pray not to catch it especially as someone as myself with pre-existing conditions. Despite all of my fears and psychological worries that were bestowed upon me, I must confess that I became a prolific writer and a mass healer within myself by reading, writing, and mediating everyday & also with the help of music has helped me to cope & deal with this new normalcy, and currently as of this month of April, I have been vaccinated and now I look forward to the great things that’s awaiting for me in the future to come, and by the way I was vaccinated with Johnson & Johnson. Last but not least, throughout all of these many twists of fate, I can vehemently say to the Department of Correction that: You can lock up my body but you can’t lock down my mind! Now go take that to the bank! I survived! “A vision without execution is Hallucination” – Thomas Edison.
