The Working Boots

One of the first things we have to do when we came to prison is to pick-up our laundry supplies at 6:00 a.m. the day after we have arrived. The laundry supply consists of: 2 sheets, 2 blankets, 1 pillow, 1 pillow case, 4 working uniforms, socks, t-shirts, underwear, bras and working boots(a pair of male steel toe hard working boots).

Those working shoes are far from being close to comfortable. They are made in china, and it feels like they are made for mules and not for women. When I received my first pair of working boots, I felt like I was torturing my feet. I love to take care of my feet with pedicures, massages and lotion before going to sleep. I do shave and steam treatments my feet to make them look and feel soft, clean and pretty. At that moment I did not have any other option than to wear those horrible and uncomfortable working shoes. The boots caused me blisters, broke my toe nails, gave me a rash and a wierd type of fungus. We do not get any help or medical assistance for that. I had open sores and I was bleeding. I could hardly walk.

Besides the agony that the working shoes were causing me I was going thru a deep depression due to the separation of my sons. I was in a risky mental stage. I did not know if I was going to be able to make it through the day, let alone my sentence. I became aware that I was losing my memory (just for a few seconds) then I decided to seek help from the psychology department. The psychologist at that moment adviced me to read the book: "Man searching for the meaning of Life" (I can not recall the exact name of the book and the author)a psychologist who did time in a Nazi camp. I was impressed on how he described the prisoners in those nazi camps running to get the personal property, especially the working boots from those who had died or been killed. It stuck in my mind because I thought that there was no compassion for the human beings who had died, just pure interest in their boots. I wondered how we (human) are able to get to that stage of humanlessness-- I also wondered what the prisoner who took the boots would think or feel every time that he/she wore those boots: did he/she pray for that soul? Did he/she feel sorry for that person? Or was he/she just trying to survive? I finally asked myself if I was capable of doing the same thing just to stop the torture on my feet from my working boots. I knew that I would not be capable of getting someone elses boots and I chose to buy the working shoes from commissary (very expensive but comfortable working boots). I had to give-up 3 months money for supplemental food in order for me to have a pair of comfortable working shoes.

10 years has passed and I have seen in the USA prison/camps the same yearning for comfortable working shoes as those prisoners in the Nazi camps. 2 weeks ago there was a lot of commotion in my housing unit: 2 girls were caught out of bounds trying to pick-up cigarrettes dropped by someone from the outside (both were taken to the hole). Also another girl got immediate release and the 3 girls happen to live in my unit and in my immediate vicinity. Lots of questions crossed my mind as I saw my fellow prisoners running to try to get the girls' personal belongings, but the most intriguing moment was when I heard the argument about the working boots. The 3 girls have commissary boots and one of the ladies who was caught out of bounds had a lover in the unit and they seemed to be truly in love. The lover had given a pair of commissary boots on Valentine's day to the lady who was caught out of bounds, and the lover ran over to her room to get the boots back. I could not believe it. I wondered how she could take the boots back? The lady had not died, she was just going to be transferred to another prison. What about the love she portrayed to her? I said to myself: "How can a pair of working boots be above love, compassion and any of our natural human feelings?" Unfortunately that's what prison does to us-- it take the human feelings out of our body and we just try to survive. It is my hope that our prison camps do not become the future Western Nazi-Camps.

Prison life changes us, it is a fact of life. The hardships we endure here will be part of our lives when we are released. How sad for the thousands of first-time, non-violent offenders serving draconian sentences that are subjected to this way of life. I love you all. Yraida (Leo)