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Vu, 36

Vu, 36

Stories

Meet Vu…

According to Vietnamese tradition, there are four measures of a man: material wealth, beautiful women, heavy drinking, and unyielding masculinity. I was driven to set a new record.

It was my first day of school in America. I was a 9 year-old Vietnamese refugee filled with infinite optimism, sitting in Morningside Elementary.

I didn’t yet know that the American school system would be my first prison. I came to dread it: the harsh language that tortured my tongue, the boisterous classmates who wouldn’t shut up and the bland cafeteria food.

What I had wasn’t a language barrier, but a crisis of identity. My classmates considered me ‘fresh off the boat’ which served as a warrant for discrimination.

A historian noted the only two races of people who have fought throughout their histories are the Vietnamese and the Irish.

I didn’t need the encouragement. I had a lifelong tendency to romanticize this fighting spirit. Occasional school fights and Kung Fu movies no longer sufficed as coping outlets.

One afternoon in high school, I was attacked by a bully and combusted, I lost all dignity. I developed mistrust and disdain for all who disagreed with me-including my parents. I became shortsighted. Tomorrow became a myth.

I was willing to do anything to sacrifice everything. Aggression became my leverage to make the world work. I joined a Vietnamese street gang.

The higher I climbed, the harder I fell. At 19, I was in jail, 22 condemned to 35 years-to-life.

Today at 36, there’s a runaway kid in me, who has to be nurtured and watched over.

I have never stopped running since landing at John Wayne airport in 1993. From motion sickness to motion addict, it will be 10 years of sitting meditation before I learn to stop and ground myself in the present moment.

I step through concrete walls, gun towers, and barbed wire fences, and walk the winding, open corridors of Morningside Elementary to find a boy. I spot him and draw near. I ask permission to sit close. I ruffle his jet-black, Bruce Lee haircut and I tell him, in his native tongue, that he is right about America being a good thing. It is on this land that he will find his chosen method of moving through life: compassion.

Chanell, 41

Chanell, 41

Stories

Meet Chanell…

I refer to my two awesome boys as my “Young Kings,” because not only are they kings by nature, but they’re also the kings of my heart.

Nothing is more important to me than my role as a mother.

Having been incarcerated for fifteen years of a nineteen year sentence, being a better mom and becoming the woman God ordained me to be, has been paramount and the inspiration behind all that I do.

In thinking about role models, I would have to give that honor to my mother Robin and my aunt Sharon. It is my aunt Sharon who I want to focus on now. The women in my family are strong and not easily broken by life’s circumstances.

Thankfully for me, I was born into such strength. Sharon was serving a life sentence, but by the judgment of man, that sentence was overturned by the Most High Judge, God.

My aunt served 33 long years before gaining her freedom. As a child, I made many trips with my family to visit her in the prisons which kept her physically bound. All the while not really knowing how free she truly was on the inside!

Liberation, true liberation, starts within. Many are free physically, yet still bound internally. My aunt has a care-free spirit which enables anyone who encounters her to embrace her. To know her is to love her! And that positive energy, faith, and optimism is in my opinion, what sustained her through a journey of over three long decades behind concrete walls.

I had to learn from her what it meant to be free on the inside. We were blessed to be able to reside together here in the same housing unit. She taught me how to serve my time in a way that made it count instead of only counting days. By her example, I learned to maximize the moment. And by her faith, I grew in mine because I see how God can shift a situation and do what I always thought would never happen growing up traveling the roads to visit her: my Auntie going home!

So let that be a lesson to anyone presently incarcerated. Never give up hope! You never know what God has in store for you. Don’t put your hope in man!

Dorothy, 45

Dorothy, 45

Stories

Meet Dorothy…

Sometimes I feel like people don’t care what an inmate has to say, so this is a good organization to let us be heard by the free world. Because there are people out there who care about us. I walked into prison at 18 years old. I was told by the courts that I wouldn’t make it out of here. Man, I try so hard to do the right thing. The parole board asks a lot out of a person, always looking at the bad things you’ve done, but they don’t look at the things you go through mentally. I’ve been down 19 years and I lost all the important people in my world, including the love of my life, my mother. All together I have lost over 21 people, I fight hard to stay sane in here. I keep losing all the women in my life that mean everything to me. I have lost my mother while in prison. I feel me being in prison makes me really appreciate women and my family more than ever. Nowadays, my life consists of building a foundation and fighting for my freedom. I always remember: your present situation is not your final destination, the best is yet to come!! Through the years I have leaned on my best friend Tia, Here’s a picture of us spending some time together before the “hard times”.

All my choices for the baby and myself were gone as soon as the cuffs clicked around my wrist.

My baby’s birth date, circumstances, and what was to follow was all up to the sheriff’s department. My daughter’s family would not be allowed to greet her. As she entered this world, there would be minimal staff and two deputies in my hospital room. My pleas to be allowed my mom in the delivery room were all denied. “Please” I begged “I don’t want to be alone”. I wanted someone who loved me and knew me to greet my daughter. If anything went wrong or if it went perfectly, I would have no one to share it with me. “You’re an inmate” or “policy” were the reasons for the denials. The day arrived for my C-section and I was still begging to no avail. I was to be in surgery all alone. I was shackled and driven to the hospital. I signed a paper to allow my baby’s guardian to take my daughter to my home where the nursery we had decorated and prepared awaited her. My mind created images of her in her crib with the sock monkey doll I bought her. She would sleep in the nursery with curtains made out of her daddy’s military uniforms. The walls were the perfect shade of butterscotch and the floor was a painted wooden floor that a loved one had painted for me. My little girl would sleep in clothes that people closest to us had given as gifts. I did not want her to go into the foster system or to stay with strangers. The baby’s guardian had been staying in my home and I had no one else to turn to. All those beautiful thoughts were just an illusion of things that would never happen.

Samuel “S-Mac”, 37

Samuel “S-Mac”, 37

Stories

Meet Samuel “S-Mac”…

A lot of inmates just want to be heard and loved by someone. I am one of them. 

Sometimes I feel like people don’t care what an inmate has to say, so this is a good organization to let us be heard by the free world. Because there are people out there who care about us. I walked into prison at 18 years old. I was told by the courts that I wouldn’t make it out of here. Man, I try so hard to do the right thing. The parole board asks a lot out of a person, always looking at the bad things you’ve done, but they don’t look at the things you go through mentally. I’ve been down 19 years and I lost all the important people in my world, including the love of my life, my mother. All together I have lost over 21 people, I fight hard to stay sane in here. I keep losing all the women in my life that mean everything to me. I have lost my mother while in prison. I feel me being in prison makes me really appreciate women and my family more than ever. Nowadays, my life consists of building a foundation and fighting for my freedom. I always remember: your present situation is not your final destination, the best is yet to come!! Through the years I have leaned on my best friend Tia, Here’s a picture of us spending some time together before the “hard times”.

Vincent, 59

Vincent, 59

Stories

Meet Vincent…

Mom, I am certain that you are disappointed in the path my life has taken, but you can ‘rest in heaven’ with the knowledge that it was no fault of yours. You once told me that it took you 32 years to control your attitude, and prayed that it wouldn’t take me as long to control mine. Well mom, it did. However, it came with an abundance of insight. It would tear at your core that I am in this situation – knowing my heart – but you would applaud the resolve. The strength of mind I maintain, while enduring this life sentence would amaze you. My only regret in life is not heeding your advice.

I want to pay tribute, with an apology letter to my mother Wilma, who passed away at the age of 39, when I was 23.

You were there for me through many twists and turns in my life, hoping that I would latch onto the best that you provided. But what you could not know before ‘going home to rest’ (or maybe you did), was that I was chasing ghosts in my mind that resembled an active dad—which I believe was the root cause of my detachment from reality.

I realize at 59, the lessons you were instilling in me so long ago, where to pave my path into manhood. I now see that your essence pervades my entire being. Your strength, your calmness, your beauty, your genuineness, your love for others consume my thoughts.

I think about your pains and your resolve – then I smile because I can pinpoint every one of your characteristics that I possessed as a child and young man. You gave me the strength to survive. Mom, I praise your name constantly. I look to your wisdom and guidance to see me through my days.

I wish you were here for your grandchildren and great-grandchildren that would bring you so much joy. I see you everywhere, in the mall, but mostly, I see you in me. You will forever be my hero mommy, and I will always credit my accomplishments to you. I wish I had more time with you, and I miss you so much.

Now, where I am – you will always be, in my heart! In closing, I want to say that you would probably tell me to apologize to my children and my grandchildren for not being there. But today mommy, I want my apology to go to you. The core of my world.

Eugene “Shaylee”, 53

Eugene “Shaylee”, 53

Stories

Meet Eugene…

The best word that I can think of to describe my childhood and adolescence is confused. The reason I say this is for the fact that my upbringing was somewhat normal, while at the same time quite unusual.

Being raised by a single mom and older sister, my life was better than some but worse than others, it all depends on who’s judging. For people who have grown up in poverty with a hand-to-mouth existence, and an inbred ghettoized, fool’s-gold ideology, I’m considered a survivor.

To those who conform to a higher standard of morality or virtue, there’s two types of viewpoints that I’ve personally encountered overall: traditions, and liberals.

The first, tend to obey or agree with fogyish, well established, orthodox principles and procedures. Their belief is that an adult’s decision-making is based on choice, and not subject to the rule or control of outside influence.

The latter, is free from rigidly fixed preconceptions, unconventional and considerate of the fundamental factors involved in a person’s decision making. I also know that there is an upper echelon of society that governs the mechanisms of my worldly existence. To them I’m only a commodity.

Last but not least are the godly people, who believe that everything happens for a reason and it’s all part of god’s plan. I know this sounds confusing and you’re probably saying, “What’s this have to do with him as a person?”

Well I’ll say this; my mentality, emotions, and ideology is based on my entire existence being a battle against poverty, lawfully and unlawfully. For every good deed that I’ve done, there’s also a bad one, for I have lived unrighteous as well as righteous.

Consequently, I find it somewhat difficult to publicly display happiness without sorrow, or gratitude without remorse. Quite frankly, I’m too ashamed to be proud about the life that I was living, and I don’t want to pour salt on an open wound. However, I will say this though;

I’m deeply humbled, and I truly respect my detriment as lessons and my benefit’s as blessings. At this point, my number one priority in life is to recompense and reconcile with the ones I’ve hurt and the ones I love. Until then, my peace of mind and happy heart will remain empty.

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