I should be dead, but for some reason I’m not. I want to do something with the time I have left that is important and helpful to others.
Noah, 50
Incarcerated: 25 years
I’ve hit my head enough times that I’ve lost count. More than ten. The first time I cracked it open, I was five. I was reckless, impulsive, inconsiderate and violent. If I wasn’t hitting my own head I was hitting someone else’s. But in my heart I didn’t want to be that person. At five I was running down a hill, tripped and hit my forehead on a curb, putting a divot that can still be seen today. I began to get into a lot of trouble at school. Fighting, vandalism. I remember vividly, my father saying: “What the hell is wrong with you? We are hippies, why are you so violent?” I asked myself the same question, and as time went on the only answer I had, that’s the way men are supposed to be. My ability to understand it was no better than anyone else. This led to cracking windshields with my head, being stepped on by a horse, breaking motorcycle helmets and bending Billy clubs. I should be dead, but for some reason I’m not. I want to do something with the time I have left that is important and helpful to others. I want to become an expert on the correlation between head injuries and criminality.
